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

Nobody on this side of the House is arguing against consistency or the right of the Government to frame policy. The specific problem with the section 28 mandatory ministerial guidelines is that they enable the Minister to institute profound changes to planning law without a single vote being taken in this House. That is the problem. As a direct result of the two sets of section 28 mandatory ministerial guidelines the Minister's predecessor introduced, we have had a perpetual series of conflicts at the High Court, often involving local authorities or third parties against An Bord Pleanála. The board has lost such a large volume of these cases that the bill to the taxpayer is running to millions of euro.

I made this point in our previous exchange. Returning to the two-stage planning process involving the planning authority and the board is a really good move, but unless the mandatory ministerial guidelines are removed and the misuse of the policy objectives in the national planning framework by the board is addressed - I make this point again because it does not get said enough - we are still going to have the same delays. Whether it is the local authorities or third parties, they are going to challenge decisions by the board to the courts, albeit at the second appeal stage, and, on the basis of the decisions the courts have made to date, the board and the bad and undemocratic planning decisions made by a Minister in previous years are at the centre of this.

This is an eminently sensible amendment. It is entirely consistent with what the Minister is saying he wants to do with this Bill. The Minister is misrepresenting the amendment to say that it would remove a Minister's power. A Minister should only have the power that is entrusted to him or her by the elected Members of the Oireachtas. They should not be able to make profound changes to planning law by diktat. That is what this amendment seeks to remove.

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