Mr. Paul Kenny:

I will respond to the point made about planning permission. When I was speaking about planning permission, I was referring to rooftop solar panels. A person living in Germany, Britain or Northern Ireland can install solar panels on his or her roof without having to seek planning permission. The authorities in these jurisdictions have decided that solar panels do not affect the character of buildings, other than heritage buildings. The paper we submitted to the committee in March was written by two planning experts. An Bord Pleanála's decision that certain developments were exempt was in agreement with the paper. Under an exempted development statutory instrument introduced in John Gormley's time as Minister which had been designed for solar thermal systems, panels to a certain number of square metres are allowed. If we change the number in the statutory instrument, we will remove completely a significant barrier to rooftop solar panels. We have been campaigning on this issue for many years. It is extremely frustrating, given that people everywhere else in Europe do not have to spend money in this way. Local authority planners will ask why they should waste €2,000 or €3,000 worth of a planner's time in the assessment of a planning application when all that is involved is the installation of solar panels on the roof.