Marc MacSharry (Fianna Fail)

I join my colleague, Senator O'Donovan, in calling for a debate on planning. Many times over the past seven years I have called for such a debate, especially regarding the right to object. While there is no doubt that the contribution of An Taisce has been very valuable over recent years as a prescribed organisation, one would certainly query the timing with which it tends to lodge objections to particular developments.

There certainly have been cases when people have tried to join An Taisce and they may have been seen as the wrong types of members. Wicklow springs to mind as a place where people were not being taken in because it was felt they would have views more consistent with rural development than An Taisce with regard to trying to object and block rural development. As somebody who is from regional Ireland, I would like to see our areas develop as something other than just the exclusive reserve of weekend commuters who wish to go to the west in search of Peig Sayers looking out over a half door. More goes on in such areas.