Pat Casey (Wicklow, Fianna Fail)
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I thank the witnesses for their presentations. Following a two-year period, this is our first opportunity to discuss the strategic housing development review, SHDR. It is critical that we get down to the nuts and bolts of the practical operation of this process. I will start by making some general statements. It is the consultation and the community involvement process relating to strategic housing developments, SHDs, with which I have a problem. I am not being critical but trying to be as practical as possible.

I will give an example of that from last week when the committee was discussing the Land Development Agency, LDA. It concerns local area plans. In Wicklow, a number of local area plans were adopted in 2006 but were not reviewed after the six-year period because of the economic crash. They were meant to be reviewed in 2018 but they were not reviewed because of the publication of the national planning framework. We then had to hold off for the regional strategic plan and now must wait for a county development plan, following which the authority's local area plan can be decided. A period of up to 21 years will have elapsed before the community will have a direct involvement in the way their community develops.

That is my fundamental problem with the SHDs. They now have the remit of national policy to force 35 houses to the hectare in small towns where that is completely inappropriate. The only vehicle a community has in that case is judicial review, which is unaffordable. Regarding the board, Mr. Hyde said in his opening statement that public participation would be to the fore. However, that is not the case with regard to whether SHDs are in line with local area and county plans. It might be so with regard to national plans, but not with any plan below that level. From a transparency perspective, I have a fundamental problem with SHDs. If local area plans were in line, that community involvement would have been there. However, it is not.

The approval of 67 of a total of 101 SHD applications is almost being promoted here today as a success. It is a failure when 34 of 101 applications are not approved in a process that has to go through pre-planning with the relevant local authority and An Bord Pleanála. There are two consultations and then a final application is submitted to the board. Mr. Hyde said in response to Senator Boyhan that there was no need for further information, which would delay the process. In that case, how did 34 of 101 applications fail? Was the principle of the application at fault? If the principle was not at fault, it was a minor issue which could easily have been dealt with by way of further information or a planning clarification. We are being told 67 approvals is a success in a process that was meant to streamline this. It is a failure that 34 applications failed and, as such, I question the assertion that further information is not needed. That is to state clearly that the application should never have been submitted. Is there, therefore, an issue with the pre-planning consultation with the local authority and the board? There was room in the legislation for either the board or the applicant to request a second meeting to discuss issues. Has such a second meeting ever been requested by a developer or the board given the failure rate of more than 30%?

Has any material contravention been invoked in relation to the applications which have gone through so far? We are all here to try to get the system working but the frustration is beginning to come. One or two of the witnesses might have said that. It is not necessarily the planning system that is the roadblock. It is what takes place after an application has gone through the system. I am hearing anecdotally that there are serious issues in relation to Irish Water and getting information from the company in order to proceed on site. To get planning permission and then to have to wait two years to get on site is ridiculous. The waiting time is between six months and two years. At this stage, I wonder whether these issues should have been gone through by the time the final planning permission is granted. Of the 67 applications that were granted, one wonders how many of the sites have been flipped and sold on the market for a higher value. This is where there might be an opportunity to ensure a developer makes a greater commitment to the planning system in having to engage in compliance, commit to Part V and obtain permission from Irish Water before obtaining planning permission. That would put us all in a position to say there is nothing to delay the development of the site. At the moment, however, we are issuing planning permission before all of these other issues have been dealt with. It is not necessarily a failure of the SHDs, but rather of the whole planning system which needs to be developed.

Regarding maximum densities, it goes back to the consultation process with communities. In some of our towns, they are not fit for purpose. Apartments must be included to achieve the target of 35 homes per hectare in respect of complying with public and private open space. It is not viable any other way. Apartments are not suitable in many of our smaller towns yet these national guidelines are being applied. I have probably gone way over time. I will come back in during the second round.