Fergus O'Dowd (Louth, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

It was the case in the past that usually, if not always, the new development plan coincided with the first two months of the new council. The old council knew nothing about it and was not in a position to challenge or interrogate the development plan. The Minister of State is the man who is in place, but I think the development plans should be dealt with in the cycle of the existing council period of five years, and ideally at the commencement of that. That would give greater transparency, commitment, awareness and knowledge of what is in those plans.

Many objectors are legitimate; they are not all chancers and many of them have very good points to make. One of the problems when we get planning objections from people is they do not know about the plan, so we need a new way of dealing with that. When Louth County Council was introducing a new development plan, it went to the supermarkets and other public places, had public exhibitions, took a room at a local hotel and people knew it was going on, or at least some people knew it was on. Nevertheless, when the controversy arises, the people most affected generally know the least about it. We are in a different world now and people do not read papers any more, but we should take ads on radio, Facebook and so on to notify people of what fundamental changes are proposed. Local radio is very good for that. I mention Michael Reade, and I praise him obviously because he is on my local radio station. There are these key people in communities who interrogate politicians and interrogate changes and we should encourage them to have more programmes about these issues.

One of the issues that concerns me most about my town of Drogheda is not that we have 5,000 new houses with planning permission on the north side of town, because that is a fact, but that Drogheda needs to become a city and we do not have the administrative supports to manage the new communities in places like Drogheda, which are growing exponentially, as time moves on. Our population, according to the census, is over 44,000 people. We do not have a manager and we do not have an assistant manager. We have nobody running the town of Drogheda. The council runs it, but it is primarily based in Dundalk, so I have a Bill for the Minister of State, who I hope will still be there in January. It is called the Drogheda city Bill and deals with some of these issues. Galway became a city when its population was about 38,000, but that of Drogheda is 44,000 and there is no sign of a city yet, no sign of an assistant manager and no sign of a place people can go to locally to say what they want done or ask what is being done about a particular thing. That was all done away with by my good friend Phil Hogan when he abolished the city councils and the town councils. It was a bad decision. I know I was in the Dáil then and I bear my responsibility for that as well but it was a very bad decision and should be reversed totally.

Another matter I wish to raise is that of An Bord Pleanála. I believe in An Bord Pleanála, or I did until I saw a deputy chairman before the courts for not making a full declaration. He was fined something like €6,000. That concerned me greatly. I acknowledge that everybody is suing, the courts are the courts and in their wisdom that is the decision they made, but we must ensure any person in An Bord Pleanála is accountable and held accountable. Whatever protocols are not there, board members must sign a sworn affidavit, or whatever is needed, that they have declared all the properties they own and that any interests they may have are clearly, absolutely and transparently there for everybody to see. That needs to be done. Looking at An Bord Pleanála, I have a reply to a parliamentary question from 25 October, which is not too long ago. It lists An Bord Pleanála decisions from the date the appeal was lodged from the years 2019 to 2022 and 2023 to date and the average timescale for decisions. In 2019, when what is called a normal planning appeal went before the board, the average waiting time until a decision was 18 weeks. That is fair enough and pretty good. What is it now? At the end of September 2023, it was 46 weeks, which is almost a year. There are thus huge structural issues within An Bord Pleanála, which the Government is trying to address in this Bill, but I want to draw really serious attention to that. An Bord Pleanála is not able to do its job right now and it is not good enough. I agree with other speakers we need to get those decisions fairly and equitably. Whether one is for or against it, we need the decision in much quicker time. We also need to look at issues like whether we can exempt certain things from planning permission. We exempted solar panels and that made a huge difference. Are there other things we can exempt? I do not have an analysis of the figures and what the appeals are for, but I am sure sometimes somebody objects to a neighbour’s fence or shed in the backyard. If we were to pay attention to the reasons appeals go there, could we remove those from the list? Would it make sense for that to happen?

The other issue I wish to raise was brought fairly clearly to mind by Barry O’Kelly’s programme, namely, if one sets up a NGO as a bona fide organisation, what register is it on? There are very many genuine NGOs out there, but especially if they are making planning objection there should be a register and they must be on it. I presume somebody can do due diligence on that, but if there is a register one can check who the directors are and whether the organisation is audited. These are basic questions like the who, what, where and why of the NGO. A bona fide NGO will have no problem with that. Even a small NGO will not have a problem. However, if an NGO is like the one set up by the gentleman I saw on television last week then I have a real problem with that and it must be addressed. It must be stopped and stopped now.

The other point I want to raise is a talking topic at the moment around the country and indeed in this Chamber. It is the question of people sleeping in our streets tonight, international protection applicants who have nowhere to go. Why am I raising it here? I have a very good reason. I have a communication from a person in my constituency who has been working with a number of developers who have channelled significant investment into provision of the required accommodation for persons seeking international protection and also those from Ukraine fleeing the war. The developers have a lot of accommodation ready to be slept in tonight. It is already there. What is the problem? The problem is the fire service is overloaded with applications and cannot certify those buildings meet the fire certificate standards, even though they have already been accepted by the Department. I have tabled a parliamentary question on this for the Minister, rather than the Minister of State, asking how much accommodation has already been agreed for occupation with the Minister that is being prevented from being occupied because the fire services cannot deal with it. The answer is very simple. We as a State, or whatever, should employ appropriate, professional and independent people who are fully qualified to certify that those buildings meet the fire standards. The fire people are doing their very best, so I am not blaming them, but if we have not got the resources we must buy them in and that is what is not happening, to the best of my knowledge. This gentleman tells me we now have the ridiculous situation of hotels, hostels and bed and breakfasts that have been upgraded, assessed and certified by a competent person and are ready to provide much-needed shelter but await this further inspection. They remain in limbo. This constituent of mine is a small practitioner. He is aware of four different premises with approximately 250 beds that are fully certified and ready to be occupied this very night, but this is not happening. It is a very important point. I have asked the Minister to seek from IPAS confirmation of the total number of beds around the country that have been offered to IPAS with certification by a competent person that are yet to be taken up. I will have his answer in a couple of days. There is more we can do. Regardless of one’s view on it, we are doing our very best for the people from Ukraine and for international protection applicants. It is wrong as we head into Christmas that anybody is sleeping rough on our streets or sleeping in a tent in the cold with all the consequent issues that has for their health.

That is a short journey around the planning issues as I see them. The Bill has many good things in it and there are lots of good suggestions coming from people. Things have changed radically. I had thought the corruption and the brown envelope had disappeared forever, but they actually have not. There have been fundamental changes, more accountability and more transparency and that is what we need.

I welcome this debate.

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