Aengus Ó Snodaigh (Dublin South Central, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

I can cede to the Minister of State if he has a point of order.

In my area in Dublin South-Central there has been much construction. The Minister of State might know this as he passes through it regularly, and he may be familiar with some of the sites. Despite the collapse, construction has continued and a number of proposals have gone into Dublin City Council in recent years. The vulture funds mentioned earlier do not have a problem complying with the existing rules, regulations and guidelines contained within the Dublin city development plans. They are building at Clancy Barracks now as the plan was developed a number of years ago; it collapsed in the downturn when developers overextended but a company came in, bought it and is going ahead with it, regardless of price increases and the Minister of State's proposals to undermine the democratically elected councillors in this city who set out guidelines above the Department's guidelines. There are a number of other examples, and I mentioned earlier a number of proposals from both private and public developers who wanted to go ahead but were prevented from doing so, sometimes because of Dublin City Council. That was the case with the Davitt Road site, which is now in the ownership of the HSE. The plan was to build duplexes on the site but Dublin City Council indicated that was not dense enough. The developer felt it could make money from a site at low density but it was prevented from doing so by the city council planners. That is their issue.

There are other proposals that were prevented by the Minister only a number of months ago. That had nothing to do with money as it was social housing. The site I mentioned is Cornamona on Kylemore Road. The city council sought to build 75 units for senior citizen accommodation on the Cornamona site but the Minister ordered the plan to be resubmitted as he wanted only 60 units. That was absolute madness, and it happened within the guidelines currently set. The site is empty but it is serviced. It has been sitting there since before the downturn because buildings were knocked down. The city council has waited for funding from the Minister. The council has resubmitted the plan and the Minister agreed with it but it now involves lower number of units. It is welcome to an extent, as it defeats the purpose when land is available.

I am living in an area zoned for high-rise buildings on the Naas Road, as there are no houses within the industrial estates surrounding the likes of the Red Cow. The Minister of State might recognise the area. There are local area plans but there are no major objections to high-rise buildings. When some of the developers submitted plans under the current guidelines, they were still not allowed to go above five storeys, which is crazy, as there are no problems involving local residents. The zone is away from houses and builders want to make the best use of a site within current guidelines. As Deputy Wallace stated, if a builder wants to go up a floor or a couple of floors, so be it, especially in areas designated as higher density by the democratically elected councillors. It should be allowed. We do not need somebody like the Minister of State or the Minister coming in and telling a city council that it cannot approve certain plans and that it must lower its standards.

We as a society should always seek to raise our standards, not lower them.

The Minister of State spoke about England and Germany. Just because it happens in England and Germany does not make it right. In fact, we should go higher than them. The other thing to bear in mind when referring to Germany is the fact that German family size is smaller than that of Ireland and has been so. The Minister of State should bear that in mind when setting standards for two and three-bedroom apartments. The standards for successful family living and successful apartment family living for Irish families mean that we need apartments that can contain not just two people and one child but two people and three or four children. This relates to the guidelines set out by Deputy Wallace, which set out storage space. Anybody who remembers the apartments, or flats as they were known, will remember that they all had pram sheds because Dublin City Council recognised years ago that there was a need for them. The problem was that they had to be knocked down because they were used for the wrong purposes, or that is what the council felt. In some cases, they could have changed them and made them more secure so that they would not be used for purposes they were not set up for. That was a recognition even in those days when people did not have as many belongings that you need storage space. People have far more belongings now. Perhaps they will not have so many in 50 years' time. We might have changed again. As a result of changes in telecommunications, televisions are getting smaller and people do not have DVD players, VHS or Betamax. People have fewer books because they have tablets so they might not have as many possessions in the future.

The Minister of State also argued that it would be madness to bring the guidelines back to this House but he did not even consider whether it might be appropriate to bring them back to the select committee and let it have a discussion once a year or once every ten years when these guidelines need to changed. The Minister of State just ruled it out altogether and said it would not be appropriate. He spoke about how councils and planning departments were denuded of staff. Whose fault is that? First, we have the lack of funding for local authorities and, second, both this and the previous Government had a jobs embargo, although this Government eventually changed it. When people retired, they were not replaced.

See this speech in context