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

I move amendment No. 195:

In page 69, line 4, to delete “Government” and substitute “Oireachtas”.

When this legislation began its long and controversial life, we were promised that it would not only consolidate 20 years of complex planning legislation but that in doing so, it would also clarify that legislation, ensuring that it was easier for applicants and planning authorities to use, and as a result it would streamline decision-making and expedite the delivery of, for example, much-needed housing, renewable energy infrastructure and critical infrastructure. A number of sections in this Bill are profoundly problematic from a democratic and planning point of view, but also, crucially, they will make our planning system much more complicated and less clear. This will lead to increased levels of conflict between communities and councillors, local communities and planning authorities and, ultimately, applicants and planning authorities in the courts. That will result in increased third-party observations, appeals to An Bord Pleanála and judicial review. The consequence of all of that will be delay. It is probably the single biggest failing of this legislation, which we were told would make it easier to ensure that the country would get the critical infrastructure it needs, but will actually make it much more difficult.

Some sections are relatively straightforward. Some have minor or modest problems, but this entire element of the Bill, running over a number of sections, is one of the most problematic. It is an area of the Bill that has probably not received as much public attention, in public commentary, as some of the others. We had detailed discussions about it on Committee Stage but, given its importance, it would be useful to spend a small amount of time addressing those issues. I am speaking to amendments Nos. 195, 196, 200 to 218, inclusive, 221 and 225.

I appreciate that the Minister has come into this process near the end. The origin of this problematic proposition dates back to 2016, when legislation was passed by the Oireachtas to give the Minister for the environment the power to unilaterally change planning laws. That is what the mandatory ministerial guidelines and special planning policy requirements essentially did. There was a reason for this, which is that there were planning decisions that people believed were necessary. Some were necessary and represented good policy, but there was a political problem, which is that getting those planning policies through an Oireachtas with the composition it had would have proved difficult, if not impossible, for certain parties. Rather than have a democratic process whereby elected members would discuss, debate, amend and approve planning law, we got the section 28 guidelines and the specific planning policy requirements, SPPRs. The problem is that when they were combined with the strategic housing development planning process, they created significant conflict with our city and county development plans and other areas of Government policy. The matter ended up in the courts, which time and again found that the section 28 mandatory ministerial guidelines, particularly the SPPRs, were not a sound legal basis for making planning decisions.

As a consequence, an entirely new process had to be put in place. Its purpose is straightforward, namely increasingly centralise the business of making planning law not in the Oireachtas but in the hands of the Minister.

While the Minister has to get Government approval, it is with the Minister. Therefore, with all the different issues we debate, whether people have a particular view of high-density housing or low-density housing, rural housing or urban housing, suburban housing or one-off housing, wherever they stand on all those issues, what that section of the Bill does is hand to the Minister the power to essentially make planning law on his or her own simply with the approval of Cabinet.

I have a view that, first of all, that is fundamentally wrong for all the reasons we discussed. However, I also made the case at committee that this is not going to stand up to legal scrutiny either when conflicts emerge, and if this Bill becomes law and these sections are introduced into legislation, there are going to be conflicts. Those conflicts could be with a city or county development plan. They could be with councillors who are trying to oppose retroactive or retrospective changes to their existing development plans. However, it could be, for example, the carbon budgets and the climate action plan. In fact, that is probably one of the areas in which we are going to see those conflicts most acutely. I do not understand that when the Irish Planning Institute, legal professionals from the Bar association and the Law Society of Ireland who are experts in this area, residential developers, renewable energy companies and semi-State utilities, not to mention communities and environmental NGOs, have all raised serious concerns about this section of the Bill, no changes have been made to this, not even symbolic or linguistic changes.

I was against the 2016 legislation. It was passed before I became a Member of this House, but I was against it nonetheless. We continually highlighted throughout 2017, 2018 and 2019 why it was not going to work. We were proved right in 2020, 2021 and 2022 when the court struck down decision after decision by the board. I am strongly of the view that in respect of these sections and when we get to the expedited measures for ramming some of these areas backwards into city and county development plans, regional spatial and economic strategies, etc., this is all going to end up in the courts. It is going to end up creating enormous levels of conflict, further undermining our planning system at a time it needs the very opposite. Crucially, this is one of the sections of the Bill that undermines the Government's promise to clarify and streamline the process. I know we are not going to be able to have a full debate on it, but I really am appealing to the Minister of State because this needs to be rethought. Otherwise, we are going to be back dealing with this a number of years’ time, as we are now, because of its failure to do what the Government said it wants to do. This is the wrong way to solve a problem. There are better ways. We outlined those on Committee Stage and Second Stage, and because the Government is refusing to accept that, we will be pressing the amendments.

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