Aodhán Ó Ríordáin (Dublin Bay North, Labour) | Oireachtas source

We have developments in my constituency that are deathtraps. We had planning regulations and oversight that did not work, which allowed people to make a quick buck and destroyed the lives of those who were living in those dwellings. They bought them in good faith and, when they discovered those dwellings were defective, had no ability to move against the person, persons or entities that sold them the properties. I deal with that every single day. We are also dealing with the legacy issue of developments that were given planning permission with no facilities or community infrastructure whatsoever. We are still living with the legacy of that. When it comes to the planning system, and the imbalance between what the developer wants in order to gain profit for himself or herself, and what is good for sustainable and community living, we have not always got the balance right. I again remind Deputies that we have had any amount of planning, corruption or political tribunals based around planning, poor planning and the overreach of power by vested interests.

When it comes to the suggestion regarding log cabins, while we cannot let perfection be the enemy of what could be a potential solution, we cannot let that be the long-term solution. In my experience, once you begin to change, lessen or lighten regulation around something, there will always be a cowboy somewhere who will try to abuse that. It may be the case that in quite a number of circumstances a log cabin-type structure could be used to facilitate a family member to move out of the larger home, maybe to move in with someone they are in a relationship with and start a family, as a first step. That is laudable and is worth investigating and supporting, if it can be done. We just know, however, a percentage of people will look at that as potential rental income and, before we know it, these log cabins, which we all thought were a good idea for giving people that first step to move outside the family home, will turn out to be used just for rental. Can we be sure about the standard of these cabins? Do we want to be here in five, six or seven years' time in a situation where we did not have proper oversight as to their construction and they turn out to be firetraps? These are the conversations I and other Deputies have all the time because of the failure of oversight, regulation and proper planning laws.

If we do not learn from the past, we are destined to repeat it. Who has not been affected by the robust campaigning of those suffering due to mica and other issues around the west coast? Who has not been affected by listening to those who live in Priory Hall in my constituency? Who has not been affected by listening to those affected by defects in apartment blocks or who are living in developer-led constructions with no facilities and all those things they were told would come along afterwards, including childcare facilities and playgrounds etc., which just did not happen? In that context, it is legitimate when people in the political world ask questions of developers when they put in planning applications to make money. I ask the Minister of State to give this proposal from the Rural Independent Group a fair wind. In fairness to Opposition groups, we attempt to find solutions. What the Labour Party do not and will not stand over is a planning system that will not defend good oversight, good planning law and the kind of robust system we need.

Rural and one-off housing is a controversial subject for many. The Labour Party has proposed for quite a while now that the decision taken by the Fine Gael-Labour Party Government to abolish town councils was wrong. It was a mistake and if you make a mistake in politics, you should own up and try to reverse it. When town councils were abolished throughout the country, that level of civic engagement, or civil leadership or civic vision, which a rural town could have as regards providing a different vision for how that space and rural town would look, was lost. We would have a better vision of rural Ireland and rural towns if we were to reinstate town councils because we could then have that kind of conversation locally, which, unfortunately, has not happened. We thought at the time it was a layer of local government that was unnecessary, which fed into many conversations around getting rid of the Seanad and having fewer Deputies because less politics would be better.

On reflection, and time has passed since then, I think more politics is better, more discussion is better, more leadership is better and more civic engagement is better. The re-establishment of town councils would be part of that. Some of the suggestions are worthy of investigation but we must remember our history. Whenever we loosen or change anything to benefit someone, there will always be someone who will try to exploit it for the wrong reasons. That is why I have made the comments I have made.

See this speech in context