Trevor Sargent (Dublin North, Green Party)

On behalf of the Green Party-Comhaontas Glas, I thank my colleagues in the Technical Group, including the Independents, the Socialist Party and Sinn Féin, as well as Labour and Fine Gael, for their general support for what we are endeavouring to highlight. The motion is born out of frustration over the lack of a serious response to the drip-feed of disclosures from long-standing members and former members of local authorities, particularly Dublin County Council of which I was proud to be a member. One line in our motion states "the mere acceptance of such moneys from developers may be construed as having an undue influence on development decisions". That quotation is not from the Green Party but from somebody who sat painfully through all the sessions, Mr. Justice Flood.

The Government does not seem to have taken note of that point, however, or acted upon it. No disciplinary measures have been taken against members who misled their own internal inquiries. No change in the fundamental financial temptation, which created the brown envelope culture, has been put in place, notwithstanding the legislation that has been referred to in the debate.

Those being punished are not the corrupt politicians who abused their power and the people's trust, but the ordinary families and householders of this country. People living outside towns had to travel three times as far to work in 2002 compared to 1981. In 1981, 76,000 workers travelled more than 15 miles to work, while by 2002 more than 280,000 workers were in that category. Since 1996, we have had a trebling of oil prices. Those costs are not being put on people by the protestors the Minister likes to go on about, but by the Government that allowed bad planning to occur, making Ireland car dependent.

We are the most car dependent country in the world, 70% more so than France or Germany, 50% more than the United Kingdom and 30% more than the USA. We now estimate that CO2 emissions will cost an estimated €1 billion in carbon credits. If one adds the costs of tribunals one is hitting the taxpayer by bad planning at every turn. The taxpayer is being punished, not the corrupt politicians, and that is why the motion needs to be acted upon seriously.

The most noteworthy claim by the Government is that it established the tribunals but the Dáil established them. Even so, the culture of rezoning and obscene levels of profiteering by developers remain the same. Farmers all over Ireland, including many in my constituency, regularly receive knocks on the door from people with cheque books offering to buy bits of their land for agricultural prices in the hope that certain auctioneers and builders can sit on that land, get councillors to rezone it and then build on it regardless of planning, if they can get away with it. This is the essence of the corrupt system that has been allowed to continue and continues to this day. We are not simply saying it is wrong, we are saying there is a solution. The solution has been well examined by the Joint Committee on the Constitution on which I sat and on which Deputy Cuffe still sits. The Kenny report recommends that land required for development by local authorities should be compulsorily required at existing use values plus 25%. That recommendation has been examined and found not to be against any constitutional provision on private property. It has been found to ensure good planning and to remove the corruption temptation that exists.

If the Minister is at all serious — and he has yet to convince us — about ridding Ireland of bribery, corruption and the bad planning which results from it, what action will he take to punish those who confessed to misleading their parties as well as the public? What action will he take to put into practice the Kenny report which was reviewed and examined? What will he do to reassert that the most appropriate way to ensure that windfall profits accrue to the community is to take action based on the 1974 Kenny report? These are the question we ask of the Government which has yet to state it will implement the Kenny report.

Whether Members support our motion will be a political expedient matter for themselves. At the very least, they should not rubbish the work done by eminent people on all sides of the House for many years, and for many months on the most recent consideration this report. As Deputy Gilmore stated, the Taoiseach called for this work to be done. If the Minister is serious about rooting out corruption and bringing about a change in the planning system, he will implement the recommendations of the all-party committee. To do otherwise is to indicate how corrupt the Government has become.

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