Eoin Ó Broin (Dublin Mid West, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

One of the central areas of litigation has been with regard to conflicts between the section 28 ministerial guidelines and development plans. Sections 22 and 23 of the draft Bill, particularly section 22, set out their intention in this regard. When we interrogated the Department, it emerged that the process by which an existing section 28 guideline may become a national planning policy statement, as it is referred to in the draft Bill, is not clear. In addition, one of the areas of greatest concern is the way in which new national planning policy statements will be dealt with retrospectively. I have not asked the witnesses about that because we have thrashed it out in detail at previous meetings. However, there is worrying potential for additional litigation if we do not get that right and it causes further delays.