Dáil debates
Tuesday, 12 June 2012
Independent Inquiries into Planning Irregularities: Motion
7:00 pm
Éamon Ó Cuív (Galway West, Fianna Fail)
I move:
That Dáil Éireann:
- rejects the Government's decision to terminate independent inquiries into planning irregularities in seven local authorities in June 2011;
- denies the Government's excuse that no work had been done on progressing the inquiries;
- accepts that the Minister for the Environment, Community and Local Government inherited a completed tendering process for the selection of an external panel and letters of appointment ready to be issued to members of the panel;
- dismisses the Government's claim that an internal review process would be more effective given that internal reviews by county managers had already been completed in response to ministerial requests;
- strongly disagrees with comments that the claims involved in the planning inquiries were 'spurious, mostly';
- notes with concern planning irregularities in other local authority areas not covered in the original inquiries such as Waterford as outlined in the recent High Court corruption case against a former Fine Gael councillor;
- regrets the failure of the Government to progress these reports over their 15 months in office;
- notes that all of these councils under review, with the exception of Donegal, are primarily controlled by Fine Gael and the Labour Party;
- acknowledges and regrets the findings of the Mahon tribunal into certain planning matters;
- recognises the need, in view of the Moriarty and Mahon tribunals, to re-build public confidence in the planning and political systems; and
- calls on the Government to re-open independent inquiries into planning irregularities in the local authorities in question.
There have been major changes since this morning on this issue, which I welcome. I understand that at 6.45 p.m. today, the Government published the internal report.
No comments