Jan O'Sullivan (Limerick City, Labour) | Oireachtas source

Like everybody else in the House I commend Deputy Catherine Murphy on bringing forward this Private Members' Bill. I reiterate the comments of the Minister, Deputy Hogan, last night in that the Government will not be opposing it. There was much agreement on all sides of the House about the importance of the issue despite, as Deputy Luke 'Ming' Flanagan has noted, a lack of media interest. Planning is a major issue when it goes wrong but unfortunately we do not always get much attention when we are trying to fix the process. Generally, there was a common theme of improving transparency and consumer confidence while affording greater protection to consumers. It is fair to say that we all want to put in place an efficient, functioning and fair planning system to facilitate balanced, sustainable development which can simultaneously protect the interest of citizens.

Nearly everybody who spoke has served time on a local authority, which was very evident in the amount of practical experience and knowledge that people have with issues concerning local government, planning and housing etc. I am absolutely determined that we will learn from the boom and bust cycle we have gone through and

will put measures in place to ensure that will not happen again. Everybody in the House shares that determination. We are still dealing with unfinished estates etc. and such issues arose from reckless over-speculation and development engaged in by the construction sector and facilitated by some elements of the political, administrative and banking sectors. The issue of inadequate enforcement was also raised by many Members.

With regard to "overzoning" and related issues, we have already been able to get councils around the country to reduce inappropriate zoning for housing. I have used powers as a Minister of State to direct authorities in certain cases where there is inappropriate zoning or no evidence that an area is zoned appropriately. For example, this applies where residential zoning has occurred on flood plains. I intend to use those powers again. Unfortunately, such powers were not used to any great extent by Ministers at a time when much of this bad planning was ongoing. There has also been a distinct lack of accountability for the position of many home owners, where having made the biggest investment of their lives in the form of a house, they found themselves without basic requirements such as footpaths, street lighting and proper roads. Developers are no longer around to satisfactorily complete the estates.

There were a couple of other common themes and I will try to touch on some of the issues raised, including the speeding up of the process of taking in charge estates, ensuring that bonds are adequate for the completion of estates and the matter of community gain. We are working on all these issues in the Department and I hope to introduce proposals in that regard. In the budget, the Minister for Public Expenditure and Reform, Deputy Howlin, announced a €10 million fund for the completion of unfinished estates, and early in the new year we will bring proposals for councils to apply to that fund, particularly for cases where there is no bond or an inadequate bond for completing estates.

There were a number of comments regarding transparency, including the proposals for the establishment of national registers on planning compliance and agreed development contribution liabilities. As the Minister, Deputy Hogan, indicated last night, there are some practical considerations around the implementation of these proposals, particularly the level of detail proposed in respect of the reporting data on development contributions. I will give consideration to the matter of how compliance and enforcement data could be better published electronically, and I am also examining the compilation and publication of more comprehensive information on development contributions generally - locally and nationally - than is the case now.

Local authorities have made good progress with on-line information. There is an issue regarding past non-compliance, which was raised a number of times, and this relates to section 35 of the planning Act. If that is not being properly applied, we may need to examine the matter further. Both the Minister and I have indicated on a commitment raised tonight by Members for a review of the Planning and Development Act by bringing forward a new planning Bill in the first half of 2014, primarily for the purpose of implementing recommendations from the Mahon tribunal. That would involve the establishment of a new office of the planning regulator. These new provisions will represent a fundamental change to the planning system but I also intend to undertake a broader review of the Planning and Development Act, including consideration of some of the important issues raised by Deputy Catherine Murphy in her Bill, as well as other Members. This is with a view to appropriately updating and strengthening provisions, particularly in the enforcement area.

I thank the Members for engaging in a very positive debate and I particularly thank Deputy Murphy for bringing forward the Bill.

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