Pat Casey (Wicklow, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

-----as opposed to on the basis of population. The local authorities are requesting this funding initially, and yet they are not drawing it down, so clearly there is some fault here. I am willing to try anything, and I am not here to be a stumbling block in this process, but I got the feeling that the local authority members were being blamed for a lot of the delays. A question I asked on the last day, which no one was able to answer, was on how many Part 8 processes have been voted down by local authority members. I believe that equally part of the blame is with the administration of the local authorities, and the willingness to drive the Traveller accommodation process. It does not all rely on the local authority members.

The process that is proposed to be put in place, whereby the Part 8 process goes through all the way and the chief executive makes the final decision for a trial period, is quite a good compromise and I would be fully supportive of that. However, when I hear the Office of the Planning Regulator, and Deputy Ó Broin has mentioned this, getting involved, I wonder whether we are just going to add more layers of bureaucracy to a process. When we are engaging with the Office of the Planning Regulator, we are now talking about the officials of the local authorities not performing their function in processing Traveller accommodation needs or provisions through to the Part 8 process. Why do we have to go to the Office of the Planning Regulator to get the staff of local authorities to do the jobs that they are employed to do? I am concerned that all we are doing is adding a layer of bureaucracy.

Deputy Ó Broin has proposed putting it on a statute footing where there is a statutory timeframe within the Traveller accommodation programme. Maybe that is a solution. I am afraid that the Office of the Planning Regulator would be swamped and would not be able to deal with this. Then one would have to wait for a report from the Office of the Planning Regulator and nothing would be progressed.

I am not trying to put an obstacle in the way. Something has to happen, and it has to be radical. However, I do not want us to add more layers of bureaucracy into what is already a bureaucratic process. Equally, each local authority's officials have to take responsibility for their actions. It is not just about the local authority members; it is about the local authority officials as well.