Eoin Ó Broin (Dublin Mid West, Sinn Fein)
Link to this: Individually | In context | Oireachtas source

Let us think of the national planning framework as the development plan for the State, because that is what it is. It is a statutory plan that is produced following extensive consultation and deliberation to set in place not a set of policies but a set of legally binding planning requirements which then feed into the national development plan, exactly as the Chair said, but also have a profound impact on all layers of plan-making. What the Minister of State is saying is that that should not require a democratic vote of any elected body. If that is the case, why not dispense with the votes at the end of the county development plan? The vote at the end of the development plan process or, indeed, the strategic development zone process is very important because it gives it a democratic imprimatur. It is not the same for the Government to agree something in Cabinet and have a vote in the national Parliament, as it is called, on the national planning framework. It is just not the same because there is a level of transparency and accountability that arises from the very debate that the Chair has asked the Minister of State to consider.

What we are saying is that it is okay that when a local authority is doing a development plan, there has to be a vote at the end, or when a local authority is doing an SDZ or an urban development zone, if that makes it into law, there has to be a democratic vote at the end. However, when it comes to the single most important, legally binding statutory plan governing the entire State, and multibillion multi-annual investments for infrastructure, housing and industry, sorry, but we do not need a democratic vote for that. That has to rail against every democratic principle in the Minister of State's body.

I go back to the point that the legislation underpinning the original national planning framework requires a vote of the Oireachtas. Why was that not adhered to? We know the reasons. Why is it not in this Bill? I do not understand. There is nothing the Minister of State has said that justifies why there should not be a vote of both Houses of the Oireachtas on a plan that has the force of law because it is, effectively, legislation.

We will have a debate when we get to the other amendments on all of the Minister of State's expedited, retrospective shoehorning of central government policy into local plans. I want to make clear that I think the national planning framework is a good thing. It should exist and have the force of law but for it to have real democratic legitimacy, there should be a debate and, crucially, a vote on the floor of the Dáil and Seanad. Not to have that suggests the Government is scared that it would not be able to get the types of things it wants in a national planning framework through the Chambers. That is the only reason it would not do that. That is why it did not happen the last time. Fianna Fáil Members did not want to have to vote on the planning framework. They wanted to get up and rail against it but not disrupt the work of the Government, so a vote was quietly dispensed with. Again, that is not just my opinion because the Minister who was originally responsible for that legislation, Deputy Alan Kelly, made that clear.

I urge the Minister of State to give us a reason there should not be a vote in the Oireachtas. Really, that is what this comes down to. There will be a debate but why should there not be a vote? What is wrong with allowing the elected Members of the State to take a vote on the State’s development plan? That is essentially what we are talking about and nothing the Minister of State has said addresses that fundamental point.