Thomas Gould (Cork North Central, Sinn Fein)
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I agree with what my colleagues have said about Traveller-specific accommodation and the recommendations not being included in the Bill. There were groups here last week about the Spring Lane site in Cork. What I could never understand as a councillor is that when city development plans were produced we knew the population and the increase in the Travelling community, yet local development plans had no allocation for the next five years for the amount of additional Traveller-specific accommodation that would be delivered. Five years ago, a lot of work went into developing recommendations for Traveller-specific accommodation. They need to be in this Bill. This planning Bill might not be touched again. When people look back at what we are doing now, they might not want to ever do it again. That is why it is really important that it is included.

I also wish to touch on embodied carbon. Knocknaheeny in Cork is one of the three big areas of regeneration. Ballymun and Moyross are the other two. In the first part of the Knocknaheeny regeneration plan, they retrofitted houses. I must say it was done very badly but they made an attempt. The second stage was to knock Knocknaheeny and that is what they are doing at the moment. We are talking about embodied carbon, climate change, and everything we should do. We should have the environment in mind. That is the case right now. They are knocking houses in Knocknaheeny today to build new houses. They are knocking 420 houses to build 620 in an area where we have huge social challenges. We have done damage to that community by knocking their homes and dispersing the community all over Cork city. At the same time we are talking about climate change and reducing our impact on the climate. There are other issues. It is not only happening in Knocknaheeny but that is just an example of where 420 houses are being knocked.

There are areas right across my constituency where a number of properties are currently lying vacant. I know the Government has one or two little schemes at the moment. I have been up here for four years. In 2020, I walked around Blackpool in Cork with the then city manager and the local councillors. At least half the buildings that were idle, vacant or derelict in 2020 are the same way now. We are talking about embodied carbon. These are buildings that the planning regulations should ensure local authorities bring online.

That ties into the argument about compulsory purchase orders, CPOs. In our main street - the main thoroughfare for the north side into the city - we have massive buildings falling down. The council had to go in and prop them up because they were at risk of collapsing. Anyone walking the streets to Dublin can see the number of vacant and derelict buildings that different local authorities have left in Dublin. There are all these things. We need to bring all these buildings back into use, whether for housing, business, or the community. That needs to be included in this Bill, so that it is delivered.

What we sought in amendment No. 45 is that within eight months of the passing of the Act, the Minister would lay before the relevant Oireachtas committees a draft schedule of amendments. I will skip ahead to the reform of compulsory purchase orders. Every local authority that has been before the housing committee in recent years has said it is complicated, it takes too much time, it costs too much money, and they do not have the staff to do it.

If we are really serious about compulsory purchase orders and making a change to the planning, all the local authorities will have to be resourced. Changes to the planning Bill will only work if they have the staff in the planning sections. It is good to see An Bord Pleanála taking on additional staff but we are robbing Peter to pay Paul because what we are doing is stripping local authorities of the expertise and we do not have them coming in. There are loads of challenges here.

The Minister of State is probably not taking the amendment on board but he should seriously consider the amendments we have put forward.