Dick Roche (Wicklow, Fianna Fail)

I am pleased to report back to the House on a number of amendments made by the Dáil to the Planning and Development (Strategic Infrastructure) Bill 2006. The Bill was debated at great length in both Houses, with the debate starting in this House. Planning legislation seems to stimulate vigorous debate. Almost 70 Deputies contributed to the Second Stage debate in the Dáil, which was held over the course of four consecutive weeks. This level of engagement was continued in the highly detailed and constructive deliberation and debate on Committee and Report Stages.

A total of 138 amendments to the Bill were made in the Dáil and I was happy, in a number of instances, to accept Opposition amendments or to make amendments on Report Stage in response to points made during Committee Stage discussions. In light of the significant number of amendments made to the Bill, it would not be possible to deal with each individually so, as the Cathaoirleach has said, we have grouped them in terms of their significance.

Amendment No. 1 deals with section 3. We had a very long discussion on Committee Stage on the criteria on which the board will base its decision as to whether a particular project is strategic. Senators will remember that if a proposed project is of a type listed in the Seventh Schedule of the principal Act, the infrastructure provider must enter into consultations with the board. The first decision the board will take is whether the project is in fact strategic in nature. It will base its decision on the criteria set out in section 37A(2), which we discussed at length here.

While I was happy that the criteria were clearly set out in that section, on foot of the debate I have agreed to amend slightly the reference to the national spatial strategy and the regional planning guidelines. I amended 37A(2)(b)to require that the project would contribute "substantially" to the meeting of an objective in the national spatial strategy or the regional planning guidelines, rather than "significantly", as the paragraph read initially. This shows our intent that only the most important projects should qualify for the new consent process. The clarification on this point also makes it more evident that the Bill, when enacted, cannot be abused by private speculators who have something other than the wider public interest at heart.