Marc Ó Cathasaigh (Waterford, Green Party)
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I have an eye on the clock and there are many questions I want to get to. The Office of the Planning Regulator report on phase 1 states how more recently, "An Bord Pleanála has faced high levels of successful legal challenges to its decisions and associated costs – approximately €8m, or 45% of its budget, in 2021." It is a very substantial proportion of any body's budget to be going out on legal fees. According to the 2022 figures, An Bord Pleanála won nine cases, lost nine and then conceded 35 of them. In that kind of context, I find it difficult to credit that a head of legal services is only being put in place now. We can talk about costs being awarded to third parties but the fact is that the State has outsourced much of its own costs in taking legal advice on board. Can Ms Buckley give us a breakdown of the €7.6 million spent on legal costs? My assumption is that most of them refer to strategic housing developments, SHDs, but she might correct me if I am wrong on that. How many of them refer to normal planning applications, strategic infrastructure developments, SIDs, large-scale residential developments, LRD, etc.? Can Ms Buckley give any insight into the breakdown?