Mary O'Rourke (Fianna Fail)

I welcome the Minister to the House. His willingness to come to this Chamber is remarkable and we appreciate it. I also thank the Progressive Democrats for this motion which gives us a chance to look at the whole planning issue.

County Westmeath has the dubious honour of having the highest refusal rate for planning applications in the past year. That fact was paraded as if it is wonderful. Imagine being delighted to refuse so many people. It did not happen under the current manager but I thought it made Westmeath an awful county in which to live.

Whatever the county managers tell the Minister when they meet him, planning applications are still being refused. Those refusals are based on the sustainable rural housing guidelines as laid down by the Minister. Everyone who is refused is told that. Planners sometimes do not even see any point in holding a pre-planning meeting, although that is part of their work, as they are under-resourced because the Minister does not supply the necessary funds. These are the stories trotted out to us to embarrass us and ensure we will not take on people's cases.

The sustainable rural housing guidelines should be a framework but it appears that is not the case. Every sentence has been parsed and every refusal is couched in the awareness that the Minister who is refusing the planning application is in the background. The Minister might not believe that but it is the truth.

The Minister stated that the guidelines provide for those persons whose work is intrinsically linked to rural areas, such as teachers in rural schools. I had a teacher refused a planning application yesterday because she was not linked to farming.