James Bannon (Fine Gael)

It is particularly disappointing that the Bill makes no attempt to equip planning bodies with the necessary health and safety expertise that would help restore public confidence in the planning system and ensure that planning decisions are made with public health as the primary interest. When an incinerator comes up for planning permission in this country, why is it that the issue of public health barely gets a mention? When serious concerns are raised by citizens about the health effects associated with incinerators, including the incidence of cancer, why have these never been dealt with or investigated properly by the Government to allay their fears?

I call on the Minister to appoint an independent scientific commission to investigate the health implications and the pros and cons of incineration to resolve public fears once and for all. If it is decided to locate an incinerator in a particular area, thousands of people will protest. They have genuine fears but the Minister has done nothing to allay those fears. The independent scientific commission could deal with this issue. Why are the representatives of the World Health Organisation not even allowed to address both the planning authorities and the general public?

I also have grave concerns about the burden this new legislation will put on An Bord Pleanála. The chairman of the board, Mr. O'Connor, addressed a joint committee meeting on this issue before Christmas. He outlined the current situation in An Bord Pleanála. There is an increased workload as a result of the huge increase in the intake of planning appeals, which are up 33% since 2004. The committee was also told that the authorised staff complement had been reduced from 138 to 136 and that the board continues to experience difficulties in recruiting and retaining professional planners. The average number of staff over a year is approximately 128. How can the Minister improve the quality of service when there are serious backlogs and under-staffing in An Bord Pleanála? This must be addressed quickly.

The Minister is providing the grand total of ten extra staff and the paltry amount of €251,000 in increased resources for An Bord Pleanála. This is despite the fact that last October the board stated it was proving difficult to maintain the time taken to determine cases it already has on hand. Furthermore, major infrastructural projects come before the board either by way of planning appeals, where they are privately sponsored, or by way of direct approval, where they are local authority sponsored. The average time taken to decide on a local authority project is between 22 and 26 weeks. More of these cases are subject to the oral hearing process. With the resources provided by the Minister, will the board be able to discharge its functions regarding infrastructure projects within a satisfactory timescale? I do not believe it will have sufficient resources to handle its new functions. The Minister must address this problem.

Real planning reform is required. The Government should take a leaf out of the Dutch Government's book and decide at national level the regions in which large projects need to be situated and invite the public's opinion on its plans before instigating a swift planning and judicial process. That way, the process is characterised by transparency, fairness and speed — things which remain sorely lacking in our system of planning.

The latest major infrastructural announcement from this Government has been Transport 21. No strategic infrastructure Bill can hide the sham that is this particular piece of propaganda. It consists of 40 projects, almost all of which had been announced previously. The Government is unable to give any start dates or costing for projects. There is no comprehensive detail behind Transport 21. After 11 months of waiting, much pre-publicity and raised expectations, we ended up with a launch of four speeches, three maps, two lists of projects and one cobbled together wish list that has no credibility.

The Government's record on infrastructure has been appalling. In 1996, the rainbow Government planned for Luas by 2001, at a cost of €279 million. Fianna Fáil and the Progressive Democrats said in their 1997 programme for Government that they would "re-energise the Luas project". The Luas was due to be launched in December 2002 but the two lines did not open until September 2004.