Richard Boyd Barrett (Dún Laoghaire, People Before Profit Alliance) | Oireachtas source

These are major developments that will have a big impact. They are not just an individual house or small development but will comprise 100 or 200 units, depending on whether they are residential or student, and will have a big impact on areas. If they are going to work and not negatively impact on a community or get a hostile reaction, and be a good development that will add to any area, we need to consult with all the people who are likely to be impacted to get their input and expertise. We need to give people advance notice so we get the best development we possibly can that will meet the objectives not just of developers but of the locality and its need for quality, affordable and accessible housing, which meets the best environmental standards and so on and so forth. It is critically important, at the earliest possible stage, to engage with people. It is against the backdrop of the public always feeling they are last to know about developments and that stuff is hatched behind the scenes and then unleashed on them. This amendment outlines a way of preventing and pre-empting that and involving all the relevant stakeholders at the earliest stage.

Amendment No. 19 specifically refers to student accommodation and the need, in addition to generally consulting with stakeholders, community groups, residents' groups, councillors and so on, to engage with student unions and third-level educational institutions in an area, in order to get input from them as to whether a development will meet the needs of students.

We also believe the LRD opinion should be published on a website so everybody can see it and interrogate it. That is what we are proposing. I am confident the Minister will take all that on board.