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

I have three last questions. The first relates to Part 9 of the Bill. The big concern many of us have with administrative schemes is that when we look at the administrative schemes that exist already, whether it is legal aid or particularly the difficulties that children and women who are experiencing domestic violence face, an administrative scheme can often be very slow. You have to apply, there are criteria etc. What can the Department say to us that would reassure us that the administrative scheme that is being considered would be better than the post-Heather Hill case cost protection recovery scheme that is there? Related to that, the legal folks that came into us in our third-last session suggested that this issue of allowing the board to make corrections of error of fact could actually lead to a very significant amount of satellite litigation. I know that Ms Mulhern said that satellite or new litigation is always a possibility with a new Bill, but given the complexity of this and how long it took to get to the Heather Hill judgment, what can the witnesses say on that?

Second, can the Department confirm that both the density and the rural planning guidelines are completed, and it is now just a matter of when Government wants to proceed with them? Is there any notional timeline that the witnesses with share with us?

Third, while it is not part of the Bill, I highlight an issue that was raised during the course of the hearings. The Government introduced the Part 8 derogation at the latter end of last year. We understood, on the floor of the Dáil Chamber from listening to the Minister, that it would be up to managers to decide which Part 8 applications would utilise that, and that there would be a focus particularly on those applications that would be utilising the land aggregation scheme lands that were benefiting from the €100 million from the Department and that would be using new building technologies. The issue is that managers are of the view that they are now being instructed to use it for all Part 8 applications. I think that has some risks. We were told that this was about additionally, particularly those additional units on the land aggregation scheme. I know that I have received a response from the Department to a parliamentary question on the issue, but I want to be really clear. Is it the Government's position that every single Part 8 application from the passing of that Act or from its enactment have to go through the new derogation? Is any consideration given to some schemes that might be controversial that would be more likely to succeed in the long term if they were allowed to go through Part 8, not on land aggregation scheme land, but elsewhere?