Ciarán Cuffe (Dún Laoghaire, Green Party)

I compliment the Labour Party on its motion before the House and I treat the Government amendment with the contempt I believe it deserves. There is a real danger in privatising what should be public space. In the rushed frenzy to create a new Ireland of high density buildings, there is a danger we do not get the design quality, finish and attention to detail needed.

Housing developed by local authorities and the private sector 50, 60 or 70 years ago consisted of carefully designed buildings and well considered public space. Examples include Cabra, Drimnagh and other well-planned estates in Dublin. These put people and children first, allowing a parent to stand at the door and call a child in for tea. That does not happen anymore, when the car is king and people are pawns in the planning equation.

New private housing estates have a sea of car parking but no space for children to play. We are left with wedges of green space and chunks of cobble lock and tarmacadam, without adequate consideration to how resultant space can be maintained, managed and financed. It is crucial local authorities take greater control over this process and planning authorities, including An Bord Pleanála, put more guidance into new developments. We must pay attention that a developer will complete the works he or she has guaranteed as a condition of planning permission. We must ensure that owners or tenants have a meaningful role in that management. We should be careful of the privatised model; first an estate is gated, then guarded and finally ghettoised.

We need more local area plans under the Planning and Development Act 2000 although I am not convinced these plans pay attention to the needs. We can be sure that developers, jumped-up muck savages used to building dog houses and now building high-rise apartments, are not giving these schemes the attention to detail they deserve. We must insist on high quality in these new developments and I am not convinced the average standard is high enough.

There is deafening silence from the Government on detailed criteria and guidelines for these new developments. High density guidelines date from five years ago but there is no recent pronouncement on the issue and we are not getting the quality we need. I was delighted to see An Bord Pleanála reject a 17-storey block next to two-storey housing in Sandyford. We need a mix in housing developments but this is too high a cost to pay.

We need to see a mix of housing in new developments. Major attention must be paid to outdoor space so that older people can feel safe and younger children can play without too much concern for safety. We need to provide a mix of housing to the very old, who are at risk of being consigned to the lashed crosses of this world, and the very young, equally at risk of being sidelined by the housing process. It is crucial we do not privatise public space and that we have high quality design. I intend to support this motion, with my party colleagues.

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