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

-----of the other political parties that are in the Opposition.

I want to thank the Minister of State who is here because at least he had the good grace to come and listen and to defend. I would say, and I made the same point to Deputy Duffy, that at some point the review will end and the Government will have to make a decision. That is the point at which all of us will have to make decisions around what we are willing to support. On this issue, like so many others, that road is running short and all of us will be judged by what we do at the end of it.

I will respond briefly to the three central criticisms the Minister of State, Deputy Burke, made of our Bill. The first is that he argued strongly in defence of section 28(1C) to provide national planning guidelines. I have no problem with national planning guidelines but I firmly believe that if a Government is going to impose very profound changes on our planning system deliberately to prevent local authorities varying them, there should at least be a vote of the Oireachtas. It is a very simple proposition. The mandatory guidelines introduced in 2018 were a profound change and there was not a vote of this House or any other democratically elected body. My argument is not against national standards per se; it is against the absence of democracy in making those standards.

However, and again with the greatest respect to the Green Party Minister of State, Deputy Noonan, we have a system of local government. If the good people of Dublin city elect representatives who want to improve on the minimum standards of Government, should they not be empowered to do so? One in four households in Dublin city rent and the reason Dublin city had better standards is because the councillors who were elected were reflecting the needs of their voters to provide better standards.

Dún Laoghaire-Rathdown County Council, for example, where there was a very strong Green Party influence, exceeded the basic standards on energy efficiency and environmental protection. That was one of the problems that industry wanted to design out of the system. Should the good people of the Dún Laoghaire-Rathdown administrative area not have the right to elect politicians to exceed the standards? Government policy should be setting the minimum but if we believe in local democracy we should let our local elected representatives do what is in the best interests of their voters.

I thought the Minister of State made a very telling remark because he said that having higher standards, either more space in Dublin city or more environmentally responsible policies in Dún Laoghaire-Rathdown, would cost more. The issue therefore was not really about standards; it was about viability as argued by developers. There are many other ways of reducing some of those costs. I refer to the 15% margin that the developers require, the 9% to 12% margin that financiers require and the ever-escalating cost of land in urban centres. If we want to bring down costs let us focus on those and not compromise on living standards or environmental standards.

With respect to co-living, there is no argument to defend it. Nobody has made an argument here today to defend it. I do not believe a review is necessary. It should simply be scrapped and we await with bated breath the Minister's review.

With respect to build-to-rent, again, the Minister of State, Deputy Burke, did not address the issue. Why do we have two sets of standards in the apartment design guidelines, one for people who buy their apartments and one for renters? Is it that renters somehow do not need the same amount of daylight? Is it that they do not need the same amount of storage? Is it that they do not need the same quality and comfort? If Government policy, through its compact growth strategy, wants more people to live and to rent in apartments for longer periods of time we have to build them to the best quality of standards. Rather than the 2018 guidelines harmonising standards, they create two separate standards and the losers, in too many cases, are renters.

The really damaging aspect of co-living and build-to-rent has been highlighted by many Deputies. It is fuelling land price speculation in our urban centres and that is having an impact on the land market and affordability for everyone. If we are serious about generating genuinely affordable homes, not only should we do what many Deputies, including the Leas-Cheann Comhairle, said, which is to increase investment in the delivery of public housing on public land to meet social and affordable need, we should stop using Government policy to fuel land price speculation to deliver the wrong kinds of homes with all sorts of negative effects. That is why I believe this Bill should be supported by the House.

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