Darragh O'Brien (Dublin Fingal, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I move amendment No. 13:

In page 29, to delete lines 11 to 16 and substitute the following: “ “approved local newspaper” means, in relation to the functional area of a planning authority—

(a) a publication (other than an online publication or online version of a publication) that—

(i) circulates in the functional area of the planning authority, and

(ii) is approved in a prescribed manner by the planning authority for the purposes of this Act,

or

(b) an online publication, or online version of a publication, approved in a prescribed manner by the planning authority for the purposes of this Act;”.

I will first address amendments Nos. 13 and 30, which relate to definitions of newspapers in the Bill. Deputies O'Callaghan, Ó Broin and Boyd Barrett have tabled amendments to amendments Nos. 13 and 30 which, if I understand them correctly, are seeking to provide that a newspaper should only be prescribed under the Act if it is accessible, given the circulation numbers and costs. For obvious reasons, we cannot accept these proposed amendments as the wording is unclear and unnecessary, which I do not say disrespectfully, and the text already provides that an approved local newspaper must be circulating in the functional area of a planning authority and that a national newspaper must be circulating generally in the State. I do not see an issue with regard to costs, given the relatively low costs of newspapers generally.

I will speak to my amendments. Both my amendments update the definition of newspapers to include online publications, which is where most people source their news now, as Deputies will know. These amendments are necessary to meet EU requirements under the e-commerce directives to prevent technical barriers to trade in legislation and allow for the publication of notices online as well as in the traditional format.

I will now address amendments Nos. 22 to 25, inclusive, 36, 361, 606 and 607. These are technical amendments which update all references to the major accidents directive to the Seveso III directive, which repealed and replaced the major accidents directive. This is a more up-to-date reference.

Amendments Nos. 37, 596, 597 and 598 are linked and relate to development by a statutory undertaker under Chapter 6 of Part 4 of the Bill. Deputies O'Callaghan, Ó Broin, Ó Snodaigh, Gould and Boyd Barrett have tabled an amendment to edit amendment No. 597. I cannot accept the proposed amendment to amendment No. 597, as it seeks to limit the inclusion of statutory undertaker in the definition of a State authority to identifying the Minister concerned in this section. It would in our view and my view render it unworkable. Amendment Nos. 37, 596, 597 and 598 provide that a section 154 emergency order can be made in respect of works by a statutory undertaker in addition to works by a State authority as is currently the case under section 154. We discussed this in some detail on Committee Stage. Section 154 provides that permission is not required for certain State authority development where such a development is required by reason of an accident or emergency and the development does not require appropriate assessment or environmental impact assessment.

Amendment No. 596 deletes the definition of "Minister concerned" in section 150 that applied to all of Chapter 6 of Part 5. Instead of having an overall definition for the chapter, "Minister concerned" is now defined in each of the relevant sections to take account of the fact that references to statutory undertakers are required.

Amendment No. 597 defines "Minister concerned" for the purposes of section 154 and includes a reference for the purposes of works on behalf of a statutory undertaker to the Minister of the Government, who is required to authorise the carrying out of the development by that statutory undertaker. The amendment also defines State authority to include State undertaker in section 154, which has the effect of allowing emergency orders to be made for works by a statutory undertaker. This was the position under section 181(2) of the Planning and Development Act 2000 and was omitted from the Bill. Amendment No. 37 is consequential to this. Amendment No. 598 inserts the original definition of "Minister concerned" into section 156, which relates to State authority urgent development orders.

Amendments Nos. 38 and 40 to 45, inclusive, all seek to amend the text of existing definitions for clarity's sake. Amendment No. 38 clarifies that wastewater works are also works of a statutory undertaker. Amendments Nos. 40, 42 and 44 add references to strategic housing development, SHD, permissions where necessary. For example, they add developments authorised by SHD permission to the list of developments which are not unauthorised. Amendments Nos. 41, 43 and 45 clarify that where we refer to Chapter 6 State authority development in section 2, it has that defined meaning in Part 4.

I will now address amendments Nos. 14 to 17, inclusive, and 19. I do not know whether they have been moved. Maybe I will discuss them when the Deputies move them.

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