Emer Higgins (Dublin Mid West, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I thank our speakers and our witnesses for being here with us today, sharing their expertise and inputting that level of expertise into the Bill. We want this Bill to be very well-rounded. It needs to make sure that, if we are implementing statutory timelines, the resources are in place to equip these decisions to be made within those timelines. For me, it boils down to trust in the decision-making process, in the consistency of the approach to decision-making, in the timelines and in the bodies making these decisions. The witnesses described An Bord Pleanála as having its own strong identity and culture but said they face the ongoing challenge with their workload, which they do, but there is also a challenge with their reputation. We would like for this Bill to help to resolve that issue.

It is interesting to note that when there were no backlogs in An Bord Pleanála, as Ms Buckley said in her opening statement, statutory timelines were still not being met. It is clear that there is an inherent resourcing issue in the system. The Office of the Planning Regulator has said that part of that could be rectified through an increase in the application fees for planning permissions. Mr. Cussen is absolutely right in what he says about the €65 for a local authority for planning permission for one house. That €65 seems wrong to me. I would be cautious, when we are dealing with larger projects, that we do not put anybody off making these planning applications, because we need planning applications which are turned into homes for people.

Ms Buckley made a good comment on whether a public body being fined and having to pay that fine to a developer is the right way forward. I agree and do not see much logic in that. It reminds me of the system with Dublin Bus and Go-Ahead Ireland. When they do not meet their commitments to their customers, they are fined, but the money does not go to their customers but to the NTA, which is a State body that can then assign those resources. How can we try to get something akin to that so that the money stays in the State system and within planning? It would not necessarily be reinvested in resourcing, because that is not a sustainable funding model and we do not want the board to have delays so that it can get more people. Do any witnesses have a suggestion about how we can make sure that those fines, if they happen, are reinvested into the planning system in short-term ways?

I would be interested to hear the witnesses' recommendations about statutory timelines. As they say, where there are detailed masterplans or larger developments, it may take longer and there may be wider effects. How will the witnesses categorise those? How would that work? I am looking for a recommendation about how that example could be fed into the Bill.