Damien English (Meath West, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

The amendment relates to the disclosure of political donations made by planning applicants in monetary terms or other forms to elected representatives or political parties and the making of such information publicly available. This is similar to an amendment proposed by Deputy Boyd Barrett on Report Stage in the Dáil, which attracted Sinn Féin support. Other amendments were introduced in this area on which we had a general discussion.

I acknowledge that the amendment is based on one of the planning-related recommendations of the final report of the Mahon tribunal. I see the merit of the proposal, which is primarily related to increasing transparency in the planning system. In this regard, issues relating to political donations generally are addressed in the standards in public office legislation and the Electoral (Amendment) (Political Funding) Act 2012, which was enacted on 28 July 2012 and significantly enhanced the openness and transparency of political funding in Ireland, thereby addressing many of the issues that were central to the recommendations made on political finance in the final report of the Mahon tribunal, and also in the Local Elections (Disclosure of Donations and Expenditure) Act 1999.

During the debate on this matter in the Dáil, I indicated that my officials would explore the possibility of inserting some provision or reference regarding political donations in the planning legislation.This is currently being undertaken but will require the obtaining of legal advice.

The legal advice may well say that the matter of political donations is already sufficiently addressed in the legislation that I have just mentioned and consequently there is no necessity to have a specific provision in the planning code. That is the discussion we had on the floor of the House. We felt that it was best dealt with in the Acts it was in but there was a strong case made on the floor of the House, and again tonight by the Senator, that we should have some reference to it in the Bill. We are looking at that to see if it is possible to do that because we recognise the benefit of and the reason behind it. We are prepared to look at it. I will come back to the Senator before Report Stage and engage with him on it in a genuine effort to see whether it is appropriate to do it in the Bill. We are getting legal advice on that issue. It is something on which we have been working over the past couple of months and we will continue to do so. There have been strong cases made for it.