Mr. Pat Fitzpatrick:

I am a councillor from Kilkenny and my colleague, from County Meath, is Councillor Nick Killian. I thank the Cathaoirleach, Deputy Matthews, the Leas-Chathaoirleach, Deputy McAuliffe, and the other members of the committee, for affording the AILG the opportunity to express its reaction to the draft planning and development Bill 2022, however briefly. I am introducing this presentation in my capacity as president of the AILG, which represents the 949 councillors across all parties and none in the 31 planning authorities throughout this State. Although present in the role of president of the AILG, I should also note that I am the current cathaoirleach of Kilkenny County Council.

Analysing this Bill with its 738 pages is a mammoth undertaking. We feel that not enough time is being allowed to scrutinise a Bill which will set the legal basis for the planning framework for decades to come. We ask whether it is good practice to hurry this extensive Bill through the Oireachtas, given its implications for future generations. It should not be necessary to remind all at this hearing that we, as councillors, are the citizens’ representatives in the entire planning process. It is important to reiterate that it is the councillors who ultimately make the development plan through being empowered with reserved functions which are, in effect, strategic decisions that can be made only by the elected members.

While there are some good features in this Bill, not least in its objective to consolidate the patchwork of planning laws that has evolved over recent years, there are also some overarching issues which, in the view of many of our members, will work to unnecessarily restrict the councillors’ primacy in the development plan process. Local democracy is the bedrock of our civic culture. If the Oireachtas diminishes the role of the councillor in a matter as relevant to local communities as planning, it will diminish Irish democracy as a whole. Our members, councillors from all parts of the country, have expressed concern that the Bill reinforces a centralised planning structure with the county development plan locked into rigid national and regional planning frameworks. These are based on assumptions and projections which may bear no reality to the conditions in particular localities as identified by councillors in their day-to-day role of representing citizens. The reinforcement of the oversight of the Office of the Planning Regulator further limits the discretion councillors have in shaping their locality based on their realistic local knowledge of its needs and capacities.

There is one tangible and immediate demonstration that the Oireachtas could make to show that it values the place of councillors in our democracy. In December last, there was a late amendment to the Planning and Development and Foreshore (Amendment) Act 2022 which removed the power of councillors to decide on their council housing developments for housing, or Part 8 as the power is generally known. This means that councillors cannot decide to approve, amend or decline a proposal put forward by the council management. It leads to the bizarre situation that although a project is being done in a council’s name, the councillors who are the board of that council have no say in how it is progressed. The offending provision is section 14 of the Planning and Development and Foreshore (Amendment) Act 2022. If the Oireachtas was truly to value our role as councillors, it would introduce a wording at section 142 of the Bill to delete this provision in the 2022 Act and restore with immediate effect the capacity for councillors to decide on their council’s housing developments.

Councillors are responsible representatives and they are aware, more than anybody, of the need for housing in all parts of our country. There is no need to have a provision in law bypassing councillors' discretion. As the representatives of the councillors of Ireland, I am putting it to the committee that wording be inserted in the current Bill to delete the offending section from its immediate process, which has reduced the role of councillors to bystanders in this vital function of a council’s housing.

Having made this point, which I trust members will give serious attention to in the coming weeks, I will indicate one more omission in the planning code which, while not strictly related to the current Bill, is nonetheless an essential if overdue part of the planning framework. I refer to the rural planning guidelines, whose appearance in draft form has been confidently predicted by various Ministers since March 2022 and which has not yet appeared almost 12 months later. This is disappointing. At this stage, the situation is like Hamlet without the prince. Those of us who represent rural Ireland are frustrated by the delay in bringing forward those guidelines so that rural people with an interest in providing their own homes know where they stand. We all agree with environmental sustainability but there has to be community sustainability as well. We need to allow well-planned building in rural areas if our local schools, neighbourhood shops and community organisations are to survive. My message is to let there be no more delay in issuing the rural planning guidelines.

Having made these points, I am happy to pass over to my colleague, Councillor Nick Killian, who has been involved in the planning forum and is an experienced representative of AILG.