Cian O'Callaghan (Dublin Bay North, Social Democrats)
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I want to address the Minister of State's reply that the fees from public participation are to cover the costs. It is strange then that the fee for making a submission or observation to the council is €20 and €50 to An Bord Pleanála. Are we implying that the cost to An Bord Pleanála to process a submission is more than double that of a local authority? Is the board paying higher electricity or Internet bills? What is the rationale of the charge being more than double? If it is really the case that it is cost recovery, is everyone in An Bord Pleanála being paid double the local authority rate or something?

To reiterate, I have people in my constituency who, in terms of their income, are making decisions and choices every week about how they can heat the house and how they can pay their food bills. It just becomes impossible. They can be just as interested in what is going on in their local community. This is not always necessarily about housing development. It can be about other planning issues they have interest in and they want to make contributions and have their say. However, they literally do not have €20 to spare at the end of the week to cover a planning submission cost, let alone the €50. The absence of any kind of waiver or reduction for people on lower incomes is an absolute barrier to participation. The one thing the fees do is ensure is that people on low incomes cannot participate. That is the one thing about the fees that can be said with certainty. We cannot really talk with any certainty about any other effect they have but they definitely exclude a section of the population who are struggling to put food on the table and pay heating bills and just do not have €20 or €50 to spare to participate.