Michael Healy-Rae (Kerry, Independent) | Oireachtas source

I appreciate the whole aim of what the Government is trying to do, with the removal of the initial phase regarding the local authorities from the planning process for large-scale developments. I, of course, appreciate it and in a workingpersonlike way. We are talking about the housing crisis. Whether that concerns a local area level, like in our county of Kerry, allowing a single person to build one house for himself or herself or allowing the small- or medium-sized builder to go into a field and build five or ten houses, the only way that we are going to deal with this housing crisis is by making more houses available in the market. It is very simple and straightforward. No rocket science of any kind is involved in any aspect of this matter; none whatsoever.

I am proud and glad that Kerry county councillors are working diligently on formulating a county development plan. We all know that sets out the roadmap for the county for the next several years and will seek to ensure that the council will know how to go about building in an orderly fashion and the rules and regulations that will apply in that regard. However, there are things that are distorting the market completely. At the start of a debate like this, by the way, I always say, in case anyone might be saying anything about me afterwards, that I of course have an interest in this area, because I have been at this type of affair since I was 19 years old. I have no denying of that, and if more people were doing the same as me, maybe we would have much more housing available. I have no denying of that either.

Coming back to the job we are at here now, namely, trying to make more houses available, when a local authority, a developer or anybody goes to apply for planning permission, we must try to streamline the process and make it more user friendly. Local people have a right to object; of course they do. If a development is taking place and if it is going to adversely affect another property owner or people living in the locality, then of course those people have a right to object. I wish to ask a simple and straightforward question, however. We have excellent Deputies here from County Donegal, for example. As a person living below in Kerry, is it not total insanity that if I stick my hand in my pocket and put down €20, that I can then object to any man, woman or person building a house above in Donegal? Can anyone tell me why that is right? Can anybody tell me why it is right or normal behaviour?

As the Acting Chairman knows, I will not say anything wrong or name anybody, but I am going to talk about a category of person. Right now, this minute, I know of individuals who have five, ten, 15 or up to 20 objections on the go. I will not name those people, but I will say what those people are. They are not normal people. They are not living normal lives, because if they had anything better to be doing, then they would not be objecting to other people's business and planning. They have sad lives, in the context where it is now possible to live to be between zero and 100 years of age on average. I will not use the language that I would like to use in this regard, but we have people who think it is normal to be objecting to other people's hopes, dreams and aspirations. That is not normal behaviour, and they are not normal people. They are not living normal lives, and the sooner that God takes them out of the world, the better it will be for themselves, because they are miserable, useless and horrible people objecting to other people's business. I mean it. If any of them are listening today, I tell them, from here on the floor of Dáil Éireann, that they are useless, horrible and miserable. I say that because it is crazy for any person, for no good reason, to want to be objecting to some young couple. I know the Acting Chairman would agree with me.

I turn now to another level, that of An Bord Pleanála. It makes no sense in the world to me. Again, regarding vested interests, and because someone will say that I am giving out about them because of my own interest in this regard, I am not. People who have come to me have experienced the same type of scenario. Let us take an example of a person who goes to the local authority and gets the required planning permission for a project. If that decision is then appealed to An Bord Pleanála, it will send down an excellent inspector, who will look at the issue on its merits, completely impartially. Let us suppose that inspector agrees that the development should go ahead. That decision would then go up in a paper form and it is thrown up in front of everybody. Anybody at home who might be watching and who thinks that An Bord Pleanála is this great, big organised thing, it most certainly is not. It is an ad hocorganisation that meets whenever it suits itself. It could be 7 o'clock or 8 o'clock in the evening, and all that is needed to convene a meeting is three people.

To continue with my example, the inspector could produce a report saying that a development should go ahead. Let us think what such a development could be. It could be a hotel in Ballinskelligs, 50 houses in Cork, ten houses in Tralee or any size of a development, and the inspector's recommendation could be for such a project to go ahead. Lo and behold, then, the other two people, who know nothing about the project, nothing at all in the world, can go against the decision of the inspector who examined the development and read all the reports and who made a positive decision. It is possible for those two people, who may never have stood in the county where the development they are deciding on is located, to say that they do not agree with the decision made by the inspector. It has happened, over and over again.

There is often talk about what other people get paid. When we start talking about how much these ad hocpeople in An Bord Pleanála get paid, and the Minister might respond on this point, I believe it is somewhere in the region of €70,000 or €80,000 for a part-time job. That is not bad work, if people are above here in Dublin and have nothing else to do but be a member of An Bord Pleanála. After saying this about them, I would not like anyone to have the job of getting a positive decision from the board if they were in my shoes, but I will tell the truth because I am not afraid of those people. Perhaps other people around the country are afraid of them, but I am not. I am not afraid to stand up here on the floor of Dáil Éireann, call them out and ask them how they can justify that type of a decision. If those people have not read the reports, how can they go against the local authority, the local area planner and their own An Bord Pleanála inspector, who might be a head inspector, because a tiered system operates? We have had situations where a chief inspector could go out from An Bord Pleanála, do up a positive report and bring it before the board, but if the board members do not like the smell off the project, for some reason or other, they can dash it. That could be worth millions of euro in building and infrastructure, but, most importantly, such a development could represent beds, kitchens and living quarters. It could have been a place for people to bring little children into the world and to have their own unit for them. The Minister is trying his level best and trying to provide housing, but how can we stand over that type of nonsense? I am not attacking the Minister about this issue. I am saying "we", and including every one of us. How can we get rid of that type of nonsense?

One of the things I have a great interest in and that I have been studying for years and years is our planning process. I know an awful lot about it. I know the rights and the wrongs, and the one thing I always say to the planners at home, and the one thing I like about it so much, is that we learn something new every day. Nobody has all the knowledge in planning because the rules change so much. However, rotten things are happening in planning, and I have referred to one example. We have seen situations before where politicians did what I would call bad things or things that were not right, proper or above board regarding zonings, etc. I would like to think and hope, however, that we have gone away from all that now.

What I want to see is transparency. I wish to see how the system of An Bord Pleanála, that ad hoc organisation, whose members meet when it suits themselves to draw their €70,000, €80,000 and €90,000 salaries, can stand over some of the decisions it has made. The board has taken away projects such as hotels, restaurants, houses and even individual houses in the countryside, where the sons and daughters of farm owners wanted to build a house. How can the board justify some of these decisions and how can it go against its own inspectors? How can the members of the board turn around to an inspector, who goes up to Dublin after doing a lot of work and being diligent about it, and refuse planning permission for that project? How can they then say as well that they may not have had a vested interest, perhaps, in some way or other in making that decision? I will tell the House one thing. If it smells, looks and acts like it is rotten, then it is rotten. That to me is An Bord Pleanála.

I still have time, do I?

See this speech in context