Michael Fitzmaurice (Roscommon-Galway, Independent) | Oireachtas source

The planning issue is going on for years and planning is getting tighter. I believe the Government will table legislation in the next few months, and I hope it will be made more workable for rural families.

The first thing I wish to talk about is An Bord Pleanála. Why is it that nearly all An Bord Pleanála employees are from or live in Dublin? If I live in Dublin, I know how Dublin works. However, I damn sure do not know how Wexford, Galway or Donegal works out in the middle of the countryside. Why is it that no one was let work? Some 15 years ago there was supposed to be decentralisation in An Bord Pleanála. Nobody was given decentralisation and nobody from other areas could work from home or do anything like that. Everyone had to work from the office in An Bord Pleanála. If people drive the M50 every day, they know there a problem with the traffic there. If they look at a house around Dublin, they know there is a problem somewhere there. However, I am damn sure they do not know what the problems are in Connemara, Donegal, Kerry or wherever. Their ideas and what they believe people need are completely different from what people actually need in certain areas. There is a major problem there to be addressed and it is not being addressed.

I would disband An Bord Pleanála, to be quite frank about it. There was a time when politicians were being called everything and anything anytime they would go about planning. However, it has gone the other way. No one knows anything about what is going on anywhere. There are only refusals for Mickey Mouse things. There is no engagement or working with applicants. For a long time - the past two years - you could not even get a pre-planning meeting in most councils because Covid or another excuse was used. That is a major problem.

Were there people from the private sector who were not direct employees but were getting work within An Bord Pleanála? Is there an internal file or document? Has the Minister of State seen that work was given to people who were not directly employed by An Bord Pleanála that the Department did not even know about? Is there an internal document done on that that no one has commented on so far?

There is a young couple in Moylough, for example, who went through Galway County Council and got their planning permission and it was appealed. To be honest about it, you would be scratching your head to find a fault, because it is within the village, had sewerage and everything. For a full year this young couple was trying to build a house in a housing crisis. They are only one example of many throughout this country. They got a letter from An Bord Pleanála stating the issue would hopefully be addressed by March. They then got another letter in June stating it would hope to have it done in the following few months. Finally, they got a letter stating it would try to get it done sometime. That is no good and it is not the An Bord Pleanála that should be.

I think the Minister of State needs to just rip it apart. It needs a root-and-branch overhaul from beginning to end. The problem that is happening in this country is no more than what is happening with the HSE. A long time ago, politicians were involved in the western, southern and every health board. People would say those fellows and women were destroying it. However, have a look at the way it has gone since. The HSE is like Nanci Griffith’s “From a Distance”. We write to a Minister and the Minister replies saying, “Thanks for your letter. We will send it off to the HSE.” Whatever it sends back to us is along the lines of “Look, tough luck. Take it up. Suck it up. That is it.”

Either we are elected to do things or not. Unless we revamp the legislation on planning or the way planning is done, we are crippling young people throughout this country. We are actually inflicting more problems on top of the cities such as Dublin and other large cities where youngsters might be able to build at home, near their farms or whatever and they are going through hell on earth for all different types of reasons. For example, if you had a house in Wexford, you could not build in Roscommon. That was the rule up until recently. Such a rule I never heard of in my life. However, in the next council, it did not matter if you had one down there. Consistency is not there.

I ask the Minister of State to address this, if it is the last thing he does over the next two years. Planning has to be sorted out and, by God, An Bord Pleanála needs sorting out.

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