Steven Matthews (Wicklow, Green Party) | Oireachtas source

I thank Mr. Cussen. Despite the word "planning" being dropped from the title of this committee, we still take planning very seriously in our role covering housing, local government and heritage. As we all know, a good planning system with a good forward planning and development and consent process, which is transparent and democratic, followed up with enforcement when things do not go so well, is vital and must be adequately resourced through all of the local authorities. The fact that we have independent oversight of those development plans by the OPR is critical and important to that process.

The move towards plan-led and evidence-based planning has progressed over the years. We recently agreed the national marine planning framework which will complement the national planning framework and will be followed by marine spatial plans. A great deal is happening in planning for the marine and land.

I thank the witnesses for their attendance today. I am sure members have questions to put to them on a number of planning aspects.