Eoin Ó Broin (Dublin Mid West, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

I may well do that. The Bill I am introducing seeks to reverse a particularly bad decision of the former Minister for the Environment, Community and Local Government, Deputy Alan Kelly. Last year he made a very controversial amendment to the Planning and Development Act which allowed the Minister for the Environment, Community and Local Government, for the first time in planning history, to place specific planning policy requirements on local authorities. This amendment essentially gave the power to the Minister to impose very detailed planning proposals on local authorities irrespective of what the democratically agreed councillors in those areas had agreed to in their county development plans or local area plans. Members will remember that this amendment was used only once, very controversially, to reduce the minimum apartment size that local authorities are allowed to approve in planning, which obviously will result in substandard and sub-sized apartment accommodation into the future. What this Bill seeks to do in a very simple way is to repeal the controversial power that was given to the Minister by himself and by the Government of the day, and also to allow local authorities to determine, as is their statutory responsibility and democratic entitlement, the most appropriate planning frameworks for their development plans or local area plans.

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