James Bannon (Fine Gael)

One-off housing currently accounts for more than one third of our annual housing output. Some 85% of applicants for this kind of housing are accepted by local authorities. The local authorities have this matter under control. Some 90% of the applications appealed by An Taisce are turned down by An Bord Pleanála for sound planning reasons. Nobody wants to deprive the sons and daughters of our farmers and rural dwellers the opportunity to build on their homeland, where they have grown up and where they have family and friends. I have always been a strong supporter of rural housing and I want the Leader to check the records of Longford County Council on that matter. It is essential that these houses fit in with the local landscape and are properly sited.

The rash of unsuitable holiday homes is a blight on our landscape. What about the Minister's guidelines which will allow anyone to build a house in an area of declining population merely because they want to? His response is that these guidelines will encourage balanced regional development in line with the national spatial strategy. In addition to rural housing, we need regional and local services. The Minister referred to schools, local shops, sporting clubs and other facilities closing down in rural areas. However, it is up to the Minister and the Government to ensure that those services are in place for rural communities. Perhaps the Minister could explain his idea of the national spatial strategy, bearing in mind that it has been lying dormant for the past two years. Building more houses in the countryside will leave the areas identified by the national spatial strategy without the necessary building programmes.

The national spatial strategy initially appeared to be a lifeline for rural development, but the reality is that it is nothing more than another headline grabbing exercise and another under-resourced white elephant.