Mr. Niall Cussen:

I thank the committee for the invitation to discuss the role, responsibilities and processes of the Office of the Planning Regulator in the wider planning and infrastructure area. I am accompanied by Ms Anne Marie O’Connor, deputy planning regulator and director of our plans assessment team.

The invitation sought some information on the broad functions and processes of the office, which we have addressed in a written submission. In an overview sense, whereas An Coimisiún Pleanála is a decision-making body that deals with individual matters, cases and so on, our role principally concerns the assessment of development plans, conducting reviews and examinations, handling complaints on planning authorities, including An Coimisiún Pleanála, and undertaking research, training and public awareness activities in the planning area. My address will focus on the infrastructure remit of the commission.

The committee's invitation is timely, given the fact that infrastructure planning and delivery, in a timely, integrated and cost-effective manner, is probably one of the key national issues we all have to address in the context of delivering on housing, climate action, competitiveness and quality of life. Spatial planning and infrastructure delivery are interdependent. They are two sides of the one coin.

On spatial plans and the Office of the Planning Regulator, under the current legislation - Part IIB, Chapter II, of the Planning and Development Act 2000, as amended - we independently assess local authority development plans in determining their strategic fit with relevant national and regional planning policies.

These include the national planning framework which, backed by capital investment under the national development plan, is the overarching framework for spatial planning in Ireland. We are part of a system of checks and balances that was introduced post the Mahon tribunal, which inquired into certain systemic failings in the planning system in the past. This system was designed to ensure independent oversight and consistency in the alignment of national, regional and local planning.

Through planning legislation, the Oireachtas has determined that national plans, regional strategies and city and county development plans should broadly agree on key planning parameters, including where the population should grow, the levels and types of housing needs that arise from this growth, the infrastructural investment priorities that arise as a result of the growth in terms of water services, transport, schools and amenities, and how all of that is funded as a package. In addition, all of the foregoing must be delivered in a way that protects the environment and tackles climate change.

The briefing note provided contains some examples of where we have had to intervene where those parameters are not properly observed. Everything is or should be connected through the integration of spatial and infrastructural planning. Alignment across spatial plans at the various levels is a fundamental bedrock for national utilities and infrastructure agencies to also plan in a co-ordinated and cost-efficient manner and to meet their own regulatory obligations.

The link between the national development plan and the national planning framework began relatively recently, only in 2018. It is a work in progress. While it is not yet perfect, it has enabled a lot of progress to be made in joining the dots between spatial planning and infrastructure investment as the implementation of the two separate urban and rural regeneration funds, the URDF and the RRDF, demonstrate. There are many other examples of the linkage between the NDP and the NPF.

We have had a key part to play in building stronger links between planning and delivery. As an independent regulator to ensure the national planning framework and the national development plan are appropriately reflected and implemented in local authority plans, our role can at times provoke challenging discussions. We are very aware of the importance of these matters for our stakeholders who are deeply involved and working towards our common goal of creating sustainable communities. However, as determined by the Oireachtas, this oversight and discussion is essential in ensuring local needs are met within the context of the overall spatial planning vision in the national planning framework and the investment to deliver on that through the national development plan to serve the public’s long-term interests and the common good in ensuring plans and infrastructure delivery integrate.

In regard to addressing the infrastructural needs and planning, in our independent role we have a deep understanding of every local authority's development plan and its assessments of infrastructural needs and key gaps. We strongly welcome the Government's objectives to tackle infrastructure backlogs and initiatives such as the Housing Activation Office, the accelerating infrastructure team and all efforts to ramp up delivery. We recognise that the effective functioning of the planning process depends on infrastructure delivery to enable the delivery of future needs in housing, place-making and investment. We believe that our knowledge, expertise and understanding of the process as well as the infrastructural needs assessments underpinning such plans have the potential to provide additional valuable assistance to relevant Departments.

We believe that systems can and should be put in place to track key development areas, their status and progress versus critical infrastructure needs. They are all part of a wider national infrastructure delivery monitoring system. We can assist in building these types of system. For example, the broad spatial pattern of development at local authority plan level, overlaid with the mapping of water services, transport, energy networks and the extent of areas subject to flood risk, need to be combined into an integrated regional and national level monitor of developmental opportunity, infrastructure need and, critically, funding and timelines for delivery. These issues around information sharing, co-ordination and funding in the context of the various capital programmes were highlighted at the national infrastructure symposium we organised through the NDP delivery board in October last year, an event that was followed up by a report that we have provided in the briefing pack for the information of the committee.

Evidence-based and integrated spatial planning is a critical foundation for prudent, efficient and co-ordinated infrastructure funding and delivery. The interests of the public and the common good are at the centre of all statutory functions undertaken by the Office of the Planning Regulator in the assessment of statutory plans, the reviews of the systems and procedures used by all planning authorities, including an coimisiún, and in research, training and public awareness. Through this work, we are committed to supporting local authorities in meeting their legislative and policy requirements and obligations and ensuring that national and regional planning policy is implemented consistently across the country, which is a key building block for infrastructure delivery.

As a country, we have made a lot of progress in recent years in establishing a strong hierarchy of spatial planning at national, regional and local level, linked to infrastructure investment. More than that, we now have the resources to deliver the infrastructure that is needed to realise the opportunities that our spatial plans have identified at the various levels for housing delivery, employment and place-making. We are at a critical moment and juncture in the history of our country and the OPR has a central role in supporting and working with stakeholders to deliver the infrastructure our citizens require and deserve now and for our future. The full weight of the office is behind achieving all of this, including me and my team back in the office. I look forward to the questions of members on all these matters.