Eamon Ryan (Dublin Bay South, Green Party) | Oireachtas source

In an article in the Sunday Independentthe Taoiseach set out his vision for the country to 2027. Central to that was the national planning framework which he said would be published shortly. It was a bit of a one for everyone in the audience job which the oldest, cutest Fianna Fáil spin doctor in the past would have said was the right thing to do.

Should we not debate the planning framework before it is published? Will a draft version be published which can then be amended? What is the space for us to have dialogue around the sort of country we are planning? How do we influence the national capital plan? Will the plan be presented, along with the capital plan, with no discussion about the key strategic issues and how we concentrate development in the centre and put sustainability at the heart of everything we do?

That is my concern. We can go into the details of revision but my concern is that the national capital plan and the planning framework will be published and it will be a case of "it is all done" and we will be debating after the fact and will not be able to influence it. This is not the way I thought it was meant to be done. I thought this planning framework would be different and that it would be an iterative process rather than the framework and the capital plan being published and it being a case of, "There you go".

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