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

I hear what the Minister is saying. I want to amplify Deputy Ó Broin's point in the context of big developments in particular. There are hundreds if not thousands of small-scale developments so to have public consultation on every small development proposal would not be practical or workable. We are talking about relatively small numbers of big developments that will have big impacts. If you are talking about a big development that will have serious impacts but that could be beneficial and if you get people involved in the consultation on the ground floor rather than when the process is further advanced, you will get better development proposals. As Deputy Ó Broin said, this could potentially even benefit the developers. It will lead to a more bottom-up and participative planning and development process, which is what we need.