Dick Roche (Wicklow, Fianna Fail)

I thank the Seanad for arranging to take statements today. I welcome the opportunity to outline for Members of the House the many activities that have been undertaken to date to support the implementation of the Government's national spatial strategy.

As Members will know, the national spatial strategy is a 20-year strategic planning framework designed to achieve balanced regional development by enabling every part of the country to reach its potential regardless of its size or location. The strategy has three main objectives. The first is to achieve a better spread of job opportunities and economic activity throughout the country by sustaining Dublin's role as an engine for the economy while strengthening the drawing power of other areas and to bring people, employment and services closer together in a way that sustains strong communities and strong regional economies.

The second element is to improve quality of life by delivering less congestion, less long distance commuting and enhanced access to services across the whole range of public services. The third element is to create a better place to live, taking care of the environment while making the most of cities, towns and rural areas.

The strategy aims to build up the strengths of all areas in order to achieve more balanced regional development and population growth. It recognises that a greater share of economic activity must take place outside the greater Dublin area. To achieve this, the strategy sets out a framework within which gateways, hubs and other urban and rural areas will act together to promote development and growth in different areas.

Earlier this month in Ennis, it was my great pleasure to launch the full set of regional planning guidelines which have been adopted by regional authorities throughout the country. This was a major milestone in the implementation of the national spatial strategy. For the first time Ireland now has in place the entire hierarchy of strategic plans envisaged under the Planning and Development Act 2000. These range from the national spatial strategy at national level to regional planning guidelines at regional level and to city, town, county and local area plans. The national spatial strategy, and the regional planning guidelines now in place to support it, recognise that the various regions of the country have different roles to play in the country's national development. Both the strategy and the guidelines seek to organise and co-ordinate these roles in a complementary way that provides enhanced opportunities and choices for people living and working throughout the country.

The regional planning guidelines seek to make regions more competitive according to their strengths. They are also about ensuring a high quality urban environment as well as vibrant rural areas. Achieving the economic and social potential of our regions can only happen if the various elements in different areas, such as cities, larger and smaller towns and associated rural areas, collaborate more closely on mutually beneficial strategies for development. In the past people tended to do their own thing and we sub-optimised.

With the regional planning guidelines now in place the focus will shift to the achievement of the objectives of these guidelines in the coming years. An important first step in this regard will be to translate the strategic policies of the regional planning guidelines into development plans at local authority level in order that there will be a seamless and wholly integrated architecture in which planning effectively takes place. This will ensure that the thousands of individual planning decisions we make each year are informed by the "big picture" strategic policies set out in the regional guidelines. It will also facilitate the co-ordination of substantial investment by the public and private sectors in key infrastructure.

My Department has recently published Best Practice Guidance for Regional and Local Authorities on Implementing Regional Planning Guidelines. It is also my intention to publish shortly for public consultation draft guidelines for planning authorities on development plans, which will also aim to give a more strategic focus to development plans. At a micro level I am also shortly due to publish the guidelines for sustainable rural housing. When all of these plans are in place we will have an entire framework within which planning can take place from the top to the bottom.

The national spatial strategy and the regional planning guidelines are already having a key influence on the determination of our national investment priorities and will do so to an increasing extent in the future. It is vital for regional development that in developing investment priorities we pay particular attention to the development of the gateways and hubs designated under the national spatial strategy. This will enable them to realise their potential for leading the development of their areas in partnership with other towns, villages and rural communities.

My Department is currently undertaking a major study of the investment needs of gateways with the aim of identifying ways in which key enabling infrastructure can accelerate their ongoing development. A report on this matter will be submitted to Government later this year, probably in late autumn. My Department has also put a wide range of measures in place to promote levels of awareness and activity. We are actively engaging relevant Departments and other agencies in the implementation of the national spatial strategy. It is clear that all public agencies have not only to sign up, but also to participate in the process. There is already some encouraging evidence of real and concrete responses to the national spatial strategy and to the regional planning guidelines across the public and private sectors. For example, the agreement between the Department of Finance and other Departments on the multi-annual capital envelopes, which facilitate a more strategic approach to investment, require that account be taken of the need to support the implementation of the national spatial strategy in determining investment priorities. The decision to use envelopes to use the expenditure in a more flexible is a worthwhile and welcome development.

I welcome in particular comments made by my colleague, the Minister for Finance, in this House last week during the debate on the development of the BMW region that it will be important for the future and, in particular, post 2006, that investment choices at national and regional level take full account of the national spatial strategy framework. A consistent theme running through the regional planning guidelines is the priority placed on the overall transport investment, particularly that intended to deliver better connectivity between the regions. Today's announcement of €1.4 billion for national roads on top of the €7.8 billion which was already allocated and spent since 1997, taking into account that a further €7.7 billion has been allocated, is a good example of what is happening.

In the context of our requirements for an efficient modern and effective national transport system, the initial and essential focus in national investment terms in the national development programme was on better road and trail linkages between Dublin and the main cities on the island. As these major projects progress towards conclusion, the regional planning guidelines emphasise that for the regions' economic potential to be fully realised and for wider areas to benefit from the development of gateways and hubs, the internal linkages within the regions and between the regional gateways needs to be improved substantially.

The ten year transport infrastructure framework now in preparation will take account of the linkages between transport, land use and spatial planning and will be fully informed by and will support the policies set out under the national spatial strategy. One specific and significant example of central Government responding positively to the strategic planning at regional and local level was the decision to make a €90 million investment in the Mallow-Cork-Midleton commuter rail service, which will open a new 20,000 house development for Cork over the next 15 years or so. The rail investment follows through on the Cork area strategic plan and demonstrates national investment in critical infrastructure being prioritised to support new and innovative development patterns.

In Dublin, the new Dublin city development plan, taking its lead from the development agenda set by the NSS and the regional planning guidelines, in terms of the need to reduce urban sprawl and concentrate more development in the city itself, has put significant emphasis on radically improving housing output in the city through building 40,000 new homes with supporting infrastructure and services over the lifetime of the plan. Major residential developments in Dublin currently underway include Pelletstown in north Dublin, Grand Canal Basin in the Docklands and Adamstown in south County Dublin. All of these schemes also provide for improved public transport facilities, including new or upgraded rail stations. This kind of sustainable development was commended in the recent NESC report on housing in Ireland.

In Sligo a series of private sector hotel, leisure, retail, and commercial developments, totalling approximately €200 million in value, have started since its designation as a gateway. The completion of the inner relief road, on which work is underway, will provide further support for Sligo's development as a gateway with the local authority co-ordinating that development through a high level team and a dedicated implementation officer.

These are some examples of how we have started to build bridges between strategic planning at regional and local level and the determination of our national investment priorities. Additional support and investment will be needed in the coming years to give effect to the national spatial strategy and the regional planning guidelines and to achieve the Government's key objectives of more balanced regional development. Important planning, land use and transportation strategies have recently been put in place in Galway, Limerick and Waterford which will make important contributions to the ongoing development of these gateways.

New local area plans to take forward the role envisaged for them in the national spatial strategy have been adopted or are in the course of being prepared in respect of Cavan, Ennis, Kilkenny's western environs and the Tralee-Killarney area through the new county development plan for Kerry. Infrastructure investment generally, particularly in the areas of transport, communications, water and environmental services, is making an important contribution to the ongoing development of the gateways and hubs across the country. In publishing the national spatial strategy, the Government stated that it would take account of the strategy in moving forward the progressive decentralisation of Government offices and agencies.

Contrary to popular belief and what has been asserted, the Government did not abandon the national spatial strategy, NSS, in bringing forward the decentralisation programme. For example, my Department's current operations in Dublin are being transferred largely to Waterford, which is a gateway under the NSS, as well as Wexford and Kilkenny, both of which are hubs. However, in addition to the NSS, the Government had to take account of a wide range of other factors in selecting suitable locations for decentralisation.

These other factors included the following: the core business and nature of the relevant Department or agency and the location of its customer base; the location of existing decentralised offices; the desirability of clustering a Department's decentralised units within a region, which is important from a personnel perspective as well as administratively; the importance of respecting the scale and character of locations in terms of their capacity to absorb the new jobs involved; and the existence of good transport links and the general infrastructure capacity in the locations selected.

I also emphasise that the NSS is not just about gateways and hubs. The strategy has a strong focus on the need to strengthen the county town and large town structure and the need for a renewed emphasis on the potential of small towns, villages and rural areas. The strategy envisages that county towns and other medium-sized towns would continue to play important roles as local capitals, developing their enterprise and service functions and continuing to provide opportunities for employment both in the towns themselves and in related smaller towns, villages and rural areas. The relocation of public service employment to many of these towns will help to underpin the important role which many of them will continue to play into the future.

My Department will continue to work closely with regional and local authorities and with Departments and Government agencies in seeking to implement the national spatial strategy and the regional planning guidelines. The Government is committed to taking the actions necessary to support the delivery of the national spatial strategy and the regional planning guidelines and will work proactively to support their implementation. The reciprocal challenge for regional and local authorities is to put in place the implementation measures set out in the guidelines and to take the necessary decisions identifying the investment priorities for different regions. This is a particular challenge to local authorities to take command of the situation, use the strategies which are put in place and ensure that the development plans which are enacted locally are consistent with the overall strategies. The Government will continue to work closely with the regional and local authority structure in seeking the deliver the objective of more balanced regional development, which is accepted by all as being essential to our future national development.