Denis O'Donovan (Cork South West, Fianna Fail)

I welcome the Bill. It is important to bear in mind its principal objectives and the reason it was introduced. Approximately two years ago the All-Party Committee on the Constitution, which I have the privilege of chairing, published an extensive report on planning, private property, compulsory purchase and infrastructural development generally. It assessed how our current legislative and administrative arrangements ensured balance between the private and public good, as laid down in the Constitution. It made recommendations for constitutional and legislative changes where considered necessary or desirable.

The committee comprises 14 members and is the biggest committee in the House. It was enlarged following a request from the Taoiseach to incorporate representatives of the smaller groups, including the Green Party, Independent Members and Sinn Féin. We unanimously agreed to this approach. It was felt the current regime did not favour progress and development in Ireland. However, we excluded the building of nuclear plants and incinerators.

The report was the result of the gathering of a great deal of information and analysis provided by key development bodies such as the National Roads Authority, the Railway Procurement Agency, the Dublin Transportation Office and Forfás, as well as professional bodies, including the Institution of Engineers, the Irish Planning Institute, the Society of Chartered Surveyors and the Royal Institute of Architects of Ireland, among others. We gathered the information and analysed it.

Deputy Healy mentioned the Kenny report and said no action had been taken on it. After approximately 16 months of deliberation, the committee came to the conclusion that the Kenny approach was not too bad.

The report recommended that land be acquired for schools, roads, water schemes and so forth at market value, that is, agricultural value plus25%. I am of the view that it should be double the market value, given that it is based on agricultural values. I am aware of several instances where major infrastructural developments were delayed.

In addition to this information and direction, the committee received the best available advice on the Constitution, as well as having the benefit of both written and oral submissions from the law reform committee of the Law Society. Naturally, I urge Deputies to read the ninth progress report of the committee. I am glad it is no longer gathering dust because some of our recommendations have been taken on board in the Bill. As I do not wish to be accused of over-burdening colleagues, I draw their attention to chapter 3 of the report, a relatively short chapter which deals with the planning system.

It was clear to the committee that the existing planning system, whether for major or rural development, was not serving the common good and the public. Recently I discovered an alarming situation. I fight hard for the electoral area I have represented for almost 20 years, Bantry and Schull. It now holds the record for the highest number of objections to one-off rural housing. The objections are made by An Taisce. In fact, somebody at managerial level in the council told me recently that it accounted for almost 50% of all the objections to rural housing which go to An Bord Pleanála. Approximately 95% of the objections made by An Taisce are upheld by An Bord Pleanála.

For many years people from the Sheep's Head Peninsula, the Mizen Peninsula and the Beara Peninsula were forced to emigrate. This continued through the years of my youth. Now, people can get jobs and want to stay. They should be allowed to build houses, play in the local football team, get involved in the community and rear their families. I was recently in a place called Ahakista where six planning permission applications were granted for local people by the county manager. These applications were from young couples, some of whom had young families and others who intended to start families. According to the last census figures, there was a 16% decrease in the population of the area. The number of pupils at the local national school in Ahakista is down to 13. On the one hand, the CLÁR programme tries to retain and maintain rural communities, while, on the other, An Bord Pleanála rejects the applications of persons who wish to live in their communities. However, there are many holiday homes in Ahakista; the ratio is 2:1 against the homes of local people. Council policy in this area must be examined and addressed.

A section of that chapter in the report deals with the provision of infrastructure and covers major infrastructural work being undertaken for the provision of roads, rail services, waste management schemes, broadband and so forth. Also covered is an analysis of current planning procedures and the need for co-ordination and consultation between Departments and agencies involved in infrastructure delivery. The vexed subject of infrastructure delays is also examined. These delays happen and I can offer an example.

In 1985 the planning process commenced for a new regional water scheme for the Bantry area, covering a population of up to 17,000, which has probably increased. There were public hearings and full inquiries. In 1989 a plan was submitted to dam Drumbrow Lake but an environmental group found a rare underwater lily which has since vanished and the project had to go back to the drawing board. In 2006, 21 years later, that regional water scheme is still delayed. That is not right.

There is an important hospital in Bantry which serves the community of west Cork. A factory owned by Rowa Pharmaceuticals Limited employs approximately 140 people. It is a huge bonus to west Cork. Due to the dangers of e.coli contamination of the water, two years ago the company was obliged to spend €150,000 to provide a purification system to ensure the water quality was right. The area has suffered. I believe 50% of people in the general area, myself included, are buying water if they do not have bored wells. It has taken 21 years to plan this project. There have been objections and various problems during the years. The current plan is funded under the 2003-06 infrastructural development measure of the national development plan. The initial stage will cost €16 million and I expect the overall project to cost double that amount when it is extended to places such as Durris, Glengariff, Kealkill, Kilcrohane and the surrounding area. It is a disgrace and an indictment of our planning system that 21 years after the process was started, we still do not have a regional water scheme. That is the reason I welcome the Bill. I am sure Bantry is not unique. There is plenty of water in the sea but it is not potable.

There is an endeavour to build a new community college in Skibberreen. Three schools are due to amalgamate and the new school will provide capacity for more than 1,100 children. For the past 15 months the Office of Public Works has tried hard to find a site in or around Skibberreen and has now looked at its 13th site. There should be a mechanism, whereby the local council or the OPW, in the case of important community facilities such as schools, hospitals, crèches and so forth, can compulsorily acquire land to provide them.

There is a similar problem for a national school in Kinsale called Summercove. It has been established for almost ten years and needs a new school building. When one mentions the price of land in Kinsale and the surrounding area, various figures come to mind. It could be millions. If we do not control the situation, ordinary people in our society will suffer because they will not be provided with facilities. If this problem is acute in west Cork, Skibbereen, Bantry, Kinsale surely it is much more acute in Kildare and areas outside Dublin which are expanding.

Members of the committee were impressed by the level of progress achieved in the provision of major infrastructural projects in the past decade and by the investment in infrastructure under the national development plan. We also recognise that in several respects we are lagging behind European norms. We identified a number of infrastructural deficits that should be addressed. I am happy to note that many of the key recommendations of the committee are effectively addressed in the Bill. My good friend, Deputy James Breen, from the Independent Group has challenged the Minister for the Environment, Heritage and Local Government and the Taoiseach on why that report was not being implemented. I am sure he will recognise we are making progress.

A key recommendation of the committee was that major strategic infrastructural projects in transport, sewerage, or in water supply such as the project in Bantry, should be regulated by statute and there should be a one-stop shop approach to planning procedure for them. The Bill achieves that objective and for that reason I support it wholeheartedly.

In examining delays in delivery of infrastructure and in seeking to improve matters it is important to state that not all infrastructural projects have been delayed. It is a pity the acknowledged delays in some high profile projects have obscured the fact that a large number of projects have been delivered efficiently and on time. The Minister of State, Deputy Batt O'Keeffe, will recognise that the Ballincollig bypass was delivered under the original projected cost and nine months ahead of time. Such details are sometimes missed when we hear of delays in other projects.

The committee notes in particular the urgent necessity for improved compulsory purchase procedures. It recommended that the legislation on compulsory purchase should be updated and standardised in a way that would make identifying property to be acquired much simpler and less subject to delay than in the past and would achieve better outcomes in assessing compensation. In this regard the council provided almost €1 million last year to kick start a relief road in Bantry. The need for such a relief road has been apparent for almost 20 years. There are problems with the acquisition of land for same. The Bill will go some way towards addressing such problems.

Deputies will agree it is necessary going forward with infrastructural projects to dispense with the traditional cumbersome referencing system that caused so many headaches and delays for the Railway Procurement Agency during the early purchase stages of the Luas project. For that reason the committee recommended a change in the procedure for identifying compensatable interests in lands to be acquired in order that owners rather than the acquiring authority should be obliged to identify their interest to the acquiring authority. In other words, the land owner should be obliged to identify his property rather than Luas or the local authority wasting weeks, months and sometimes years in trying to identify who owns the property. This could be achieved simply by posting a notice on the property and in the local media for a specified period stating that a project is being carried out and inviting the land owner to come forward and identify himself with a view to dealing with the compensation issue. It should be emphasised that the owner is entitled to compensation on the basis of the market value of his or her property. The owner should not be at a loss. What we are seeking is a regime that is fair to the individual and the community and which is as clear, simple and speedy as possible.

Much of the committee's findings and recommendations are reflected in the Bill. It is recognised that less than 5% of our energy needs are provided in Ireland. Nobody cuts turf anymore. We have some hydro electricity but it is frightening that more than 90% of our energy, gas, oil or coal, is imported. This cannot continue. We all agree that the price of oil is spiralling. Experts say that in 40 years' time there will be a huge problem with diminishing oil and gas reserves while the US and other superpowers such as China, which is expanding at an alarming rate and recently completed the largest hydro dam, are still dependent on huge coal excavations. However, that cannot continue into the future. If Ireland which is minuscule is to comply with the Kyoto agreement and others, the notion of burning coal in cities will be a major problem.

What concerns me is the not-in-my-backyard attitude that appears to have developed in Ireland. As a councillor in the western committee of Cork County Council I advocated, almost 15 years ago, the need for wind and wave energy in Ireland and all kinds of biofuels from whatever source. I am glad that in my area a project supported by the west Cork community partnership and backed by the Department is carrying out tests on growing elephant grass which can be used to produce alternative energy. I am concerned that everywhere there is a proposal to build a wind farm it will be proposed by public private partnerships but there must be an input into the building wind farms by the business community and so on.

The Electricity Supply Act was passed in 1927. In the pocket of the Sheep Head's peninsula where I grew up we got a telephone in 1967 because my mother had a bed and breakfast and we got electricity in 1976. This was probably one of the last regions to be connected, bar the Black Valley in Kerry. In this day and age even with a population explosion we are still objecting to wind farms. One incident in my area that caused uproar is still continuing and went to the courts and there was blame on all sides. The council and the ESB, as the developer, should have found a route through farms, across approximately 16 km of countryside, that, as far as possible, did not impact on people's farmyards, houses and so on. A route was suggested but the local authority backed off because it went through an old cillíneach, where nobody had been buried for more than 100 years, and was a special area of conservation. Yet it had no difficulty in building either pylons or planting huge poles or a 38 KV line, within 50 m of a person's house or yard. I am assured from a health perspective of the seriousness of these concerns which create much local unease. Those in the cillíneach, the little graveyard, would not create any problem while the birds and the bees in the special area of conservation should be looked on less favourably, with all due respect, than people and children. There was much local concern.

There is a need for more wind farms in Ireland. Whoever is in Government in 20 years' time will have to guarantee to the next generation that in 15 or 20 years' time at least 60% of our energy will come from our island. Given that we are surrounded by water and wind I fail to see why we do not make greater demands in this area and get a greater input from the public. There is a good deal of money around. Rather than invest in foreign shores more should be done to develop wind farms and to explore the area of wave energy. Wave energy has hardly been touched. The French have pioneered a system whereby the modus operandi for wave energy would be submerged 5 m or 6 m under the water and there would be revolving troughs where waves go in and out and keep rotating and create electricity. Ireland is an island with a huge coastline and many season harbours and we should create more energy without interfering with fishermen or their rights.

Deputy Sargent mentioned the notion of nuclear power. The people rejected that long ago, but we should note that Argentina is commissioning its sixth nuclear plant in the past decade. That is how it regards nuclear power, of which France is also in favour. Our neighbours in Great Britain will pursue a similar path.

It should be noted that, in the 25 to 30 years since the involvement of Judge Kenny, there has been a notion that such a Bill, if introduced, would be struck down as unconstitutional. We achieved at least one thing in the 15 or 16 months of deliberation of the All-Party Committee on the Constitution, of which I was Chairman, namely, bringing this report to fruition. All-party agreement was involved and members of all parties were deeply involved in the process. We concluded that, weighing up the exigencies of social justice and the common good, such legislation as we have before us is likely to be upheld by the High Court and the Supreme Court. We should have had this Bill a number of years ago, but it is now coming through and I hope its principle will find all-party support. The Opposition parties may want to tease out different issues, but the principle of the Bill is good and timely and, going by our research, will stand any constitutional test in the courts. I am quietly confident of that.

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