Eoghan Murphy (Dublin Bay South, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I thank the Deputy for the follow-up questions. There were a few parts and I will try to over all of them.

Each planning authority already has a planning section, an enforcement section and everything else. Dublin City Council has more than 170 staff. It was quite clear in the first few months of implementation of these new laws that local authorities would be required to reallocate staff from within existing resources. For example, a number of staff in Dublin City Council were already dealing with short-term letting because it was an issue for the city. What we did with the planning laws was clarify the legal situation from a planning point of view.

We said we would allow local authorities to hire new staff out of the funding we would provide for 2020 and onwards and we would try to recoup the cost of additional staff hired in the course of 2019. We know Dublin City Council want to hire about 13 new staff and has already started recruitment. It has taken on new staff. Out of all of the local authorities impacted by the changes, we have had requests for between 50 and 60 new staff in total between now and 2021. Funding of €2.5 million is available which will go some way to meet the costs of the additional staff required for planning authorities. I will deal with complaints, exemptions and everything else in my next reply.

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