Brian Stanley (Laois-Offaly, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

I put it to Mr. Walsh that prior to the strategic housing developments there was a system whereby the local authority members had a plan, they would take counsel from the local professional planners working on behalf of the county manager or the CEO of the council, as they are now called, and make a determination on it. There may have been flaws in it but the system existed. Individual planning applications that did not belong to the local authority itself were decided by the professional planners. It was approved or not approved and there was a right of appeal to the witnesses. Would this not show that that system was more efficient and, crucially, more democratic? Mr. Walsh clarified to Deputy Carthy that the final decisions can be made by two or three people. County development plans could have 40 or 45 councillors sitting around the table in a council chamber, making a decision about zoning. An Bord Pleanála has the right to stand that on its head and contravene the county development plan made by the democratically-elected councillors, acting on the advice of professional planners at local level and the executive of the council. Would that not tell Mr. Walsh that there is something seriously wrong with strategic housing development zones?