Mr. Gavin Lawlor:

We would say no, and that there is not enough time for the development plans to go through the process of proper public engagement with the communities. It is a very significant challenge for the planning community but, more particularly, for society in general, to have communities more engaged at the plan stage. People generally only care when something is going up and is proposed beside them. It is very difficult to get people to talk about a plan on a common good basis. One of the things we are not particularly good at in Ireland is engaging with the concept of “common good” at an early enough stage and to be able to forego some of our own rights or beliefs for the benefit of the wider society. That is always a challenge. It becomes very difficult to get people to engage in that, for people to voice their opinions to capture that and to properly engage with that into plans. That is the challenge of the new planning Bill, which is to leave sufficient time to allow planners to engage properly with communities.