Damien English (Meath, Fine Gael)

I welcome the opportunity to contribute to the debate. The Opposition usually highlights what is missing. However, I welcome a number of provisions in the legislation, including the proposed increased powers for local authorities to enforce planning requirements on access to buildings. We have failed on this issue. Many years ago legislation was introduced which stated access to buildings should be provided at the front for people with disabilities. However, most buildings did not comply with this and access was provided through a side entrance or through the back. That is the same as saying to somebody with a disability that he or she must enter through the back door because the ramp does not look good at the front of the building. Although it was right to introduce the legislation, it has not been enforced properly and we have let ourselves down in this regard.

This often happens with our legislation. Across the board local authority planning is an area where we have failed to come to grips with the actions that should follow on from good legislation. I welcome the fact that this Bill probably gives us more powers to enforce the legislation properly in this area. It is a step in the right direction.

I welcome the change in the limits on who can use the terms "architect", "building surveyor" or "quantity surveyor" and that professionals will now have this status and be named on a national register. This is important. Many people work in this area and charge people large amounts of money to design houses, draw plans, etc. I question the ability of some of these and wonder what education they have and what courses they have completed. I would go further than the Bill. Apart from having to display their qualifications, they should have to show a portfolio of their previous work. There should also be more of a link between professionals and councils at local level.

Councils and professionals need a greater understanding of each other's business. When new laws on planning and building controls are introduced, some professionals fall behind. For example, in January new regulations required planning applications to include a contour study, but most planning applications continued to arrive without it. We seem to miss out on simple issues such as this. Who ends up paying for these failures? The customer ends up paying when the architect must resubmit everything and advertise the application again in the newspaper. I suggest there should be more interaction between the different professionals doing jobs for customers and the councils.

Sometimes council staff and staff in planning offices are not well informed on the regulations and changes in them. They may only get one copy of the new rules rather than a copy for everybody. I have visited planning offices — not in my county — where only one copy of the planning regulations came for free from the Government and any further copies had to be paid for. We still expect them to enforce the regulations. What is the logic in this? We should do it properly and equip councils and staff to enforce the legislation.

Apart from legislating to provide councils with the powers to enforce regulations, we must consider providing finance. We have slipped up in this area, especially in areas with the pressure of high development, mainly in the greater Dublin region and other cities and large towns. We have not properly resourced planning departments either by providing sufficient staff for good planning or for checking building control procedures. We need staff to check if conditions are complied with and that buildings are constructed as they should be.

Some improvements have been made in staffing. However, it is hard for local authorities to get sufficient funds to be really in control. Without good staff who know their job and have time to do it, we will not have proper building controls and the local authority will not be in authority. In most cases the developers will have the power and they will laugh at the councils because they do not have authority. We must staff councils properly and equip them with the knowledge and training they need to have proper standing and building controls. While this Bill is wide-ranging, it touches on just a few of these areas.

I have a major concern where conditions of planning are not enforced. We should not accept this situation nor should it be allowed. Every developer should be made carry out the conditions of planning without excuse. We accept they may want to change the conditions for certain reasons, but let them make another application to do so properly and let them inform the residents of the association or estate of the changes they intend to make. The public are the people who lose out when changes are made. They end up suffering because of the lack of control or the lack of powers.

Another concern of mine is the record of builders and developers. Under the Planning and Development Act councils can refuse developers permission based on their record or on whether they have done a bad job previously or been associated with a company that has been involved in a bad development. However, they can only refuse them on these grounds by first going to the High Court. We know how much that costs and that is the problem. Local authorities will not run the risk of going to the High Court.

I welcome, therefore, some of the changes in this Bill relating to building controls for smaller developments and the possibility of going to different courts. Councils will not run the risk of high costs. Planning law is a grey area and if a council takes a developer to the High Court, it is likely the council will lose the case and be down a few hundred thousand euro. That leaves less money for footpaths, lighting and facilities for young people in towns. Councils rarely run that risk. Therefore, developers know their past record will not be taken into consideration and just laugh it off. They continue to do things wrong, knowing they will get away with doing so. There are some good developers but there are also many chancers who do not do a good job. We have not taken control of the situation and stamped out this bad practice.

The main problem with the lack of building control is finishing off estates. A person building a one-off house cannot afford to be cheeky with the council or to take any risks. These people face the full rigour of the law and the council comes down on them if they step sideways or build on an extra room. The big developers, on the other hand, who know the game well and have the staff and can afford to take on the council get away with bloody murder on a regular basis. They leave estates half-finished without footpaths, lighting or a second layer of tarmac. They know they will get away with it and do not care. It is a shame we do not stamp this out and insist the council is in charge and must be respected. That is what we should do. If we did this, it would save us money and hardship in the long run.

There is no provision in the Bill to provide for building control inspectors who will oversee the quality of work on housing at the various stages of building. In other jurisdictions each level of development is checked and overseen before the council signs off on it to ensure the quality of the houses being built. I have been in many houses built during the boom of the past five or six years that would not be passed. Local authorities do not even pass them when it comes to buying them under shared ownership schemes, thankfully. Why do they allow them be built? It is because councils were not given the staff or finance to check them and control the development. Unfortunately, many people have bought houses that are not up to the quality they should be. We will have major problems as a result in the coming years.

We are familiar as local and national politicians with the problems faced by estates where sewerage and water systems have not been installed correctly. This is because of bad workmanship and a lack of adequate supervision. My local authority has included a charge on each development to try to ensure there is some money to pay for a surveyor or someone to check the work. We should not have to do that and I am not sure it is within our rights. It is our attempt to control what is being built and to end the bad work being done.

In some cases digital images of developments have been submitted that did not relate to the development to imply that everything was all right and sewage pipes were clear, etc. What goes on in the industry is a disgrace. Why does it happen? It happens because people want to take shortcuts and make larger profits, people who have not been properly trained do the work and, most importantly, people know they will get away with it because we do not have proper controls.

We have had some improvements but much damage has been done. The message must go out that we will not accept bad workmanship. On behalf of the people who buy these houses, we must ensure they are built properly.

We have a concern about the phasing of works on developments. People end up living in houses on what is still a building site without lighting or footpaths. We need a change in this regard so that developments are constructed in an orderly fashion. I welcome the introduction of local area plans and strategic development zones, SDZs. These are a good way of carrying out developments because they bring order and organisation. However, there are still too many one-off applications for estates that do not blend in well in their area.

A major problem is finishing off estates, especially electricity connections. The ESB, the developer and the council are involved but no one takes charge of it. We have residents' associations fighting for three years to get their lights turned on. These are lights that are in place and if a button was pressed, they could be on. However, because of procedures and rules that have not been changed in modern times to speed things up, the residents sit in darkness, night after night. We all know how dangerous it can be to walk around a building site or housing estate without lights. We must find ways of speeding things up and sorting them out. Someone must take control and get things done so the issues are resolved.

The purpose of building control is to make people afraid of the authority and let them know who is the boss. It is designed to ensure builders do things correctly in the first place and have proper discussions on each development. I am speaking specifically about housing estates and the development of new areas.

I favour a formal procedure, although I know it can happen informally in some areas, whereby every planning application for over a set number of houses in towns and villages would be brought before a meeting of the area council. That meeting would be attended by all those involved, including the engineers, planners, the manager of the area, the person involved in community facilities and some of the councillors, who would discuss the impact of the estate on the village or town. They could examine whether new footpaths are needed to allow residents get to town and who will pay for them, whether a new school is needed, and so forth. Builders have to provide crèche facilities for every 70 houses, but perhaps a new community centre would also be needed. It is important to look at the overall picture and the impact of adding a new estate to an area. Ideally, that should be done at zoning stage, but it is not always done then. In some cases, the rezoning has been done already. A discussion should take place on who will pay for everything and if that means requesting more time to deal with the application, so be it. The application should not be pushed through just because the two-month timeframe is up.

I have a major issue with the bonds given by developers to councils. They are always too low and as time passes, their value diminishes. If an application is granted in 2000 but the development is not built until 2005, a bond of €20,000 is not sufficient. At that stage, €20,000 is the profit on one house for a developer, who may think to hell with it and move on. He or she will not spend time finishing the work to get the bond back. If the bond really hurt developers, financially or in some other way, it could make a difference. Developers would then finish the job correctly and complete an estate in order to get it back. I ask the Department to examine the option of ensuring the bond reflects the price of the houses in an estate or that the last five houses cannot be sold until the estate is completely finished. That would mean the bond would be relevant. At least then if a developer did not build the houses for ten years, the value of the bond would have increased accordingly, rather than being an historical cost which does not bother him or her. Small changes could help greatly in terms of building control and stamping out faults.

Effective building control and follow-up legislation rests on money and proper funding but our local authorities are not being properly funded. Some are lucky enough to have a high rates base, with numerous companies and industries in their areas. To take my county of Meath, its rates base has been €11 million or €12 million for the last number of years. This year, with some changes, it will be lucky to take in approximately €16 million. The council next door, Fingal County Council, gets approximately €100 million in rates, which is a massive difference. This is the money used by councils to provide services to people. In growing counties like Meath, Kildare and Louth, money is not available to match the increases in population and to allow the local authorities to provide services like building, planning and environmental control as well as basic facilities to allow people to get on with their everyday lives.

We have been saying this for a long time, as former local authority members and as Deputies. The proof is now on paper in the form of the report from Farrell Grant Sparks which shows the funding provided to Meath County Council is only 70% of the national average. The population of County Meath has increased by over one third in the last few years. It now has a population of 160,000, heading towards 200,000 rapidly. The local authority is only getting 70% of the national average in funding, despite all the problems that thousands of extra houses bring. There are 20,000 people commuting to Dublin from Meath every day. Massive problems have been created in the county but no money follows suit. It is fine to talk here about legislation which looks good on paper but if we do not back it up with proper resources, it is a waste of time. It is worth noting that while the money Meath gets to run the local authority is 70% of the national average, the tax take from the county is 110% of the national average. It is losing out in one area and giving too much in another. That is a raw deal for a county that is in the greater Dublin region and it is the counties in that region that have suffered most from lack of building and planning control.

We may have missed the boat with this legislation. Much damage has already been done and we will suffer for a long time to come. Some people who have 40 year mortgages will, due to a lack of building control, find themselves in houses that will not stand for 40 years without a lot of money being spent on them to patch them up. That is a shame and it is letting people down, and it is what we have done when it comes to building and planning control.

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