Rebecca Moynihan (Labour) | Oireachtas source

I welcome the Government decision last week to allow people aged between 18 and 34 to avail of the one-shot Johnson & Johnson or Janssen vaccine from today in pharmacies. It is a development that is greatly welcomed in the roll-out of the vaccine programme. I compliment Senator Chambers on her work last week in opposing a two-tier reopening for younger people and, in particular, hospitality workers. I have no problem with having a two-tier reopening if people refuse to take a vaccine but it is unfair to put people into that situation if they have not had the opportunity to get a vaccine. I hope that people between the ages of 18 and 34 avail of the 800 pharmacies around the country that are offering a vaccine. It is welcome that there not appear to have been a great rush of vaccine hesitancy among our young people and they want to get these vaccines. That, combined with the roll-out of antigen testing in the autumn, will be a significant armoury against the spread of the Delta variant to enable us to get back to some form of normality and for people to be able to resume their lives and jobs.

The second issue I wish to raise is the worrying sounds from Government on the reform of the strategic housing development, SHD, process and kite-flying around making people more financially liable for judicial reviews that are taken. The SHD planning process has not worked. It is delaying the delivery of houses, which is not what it was intended to do. The basis for that is that the only opportunity that local residents have for appeals of bad decisions or bad planning is to go through the court system, which is cumbersome, long, and expensive.

Rather than examining ways to limit judicial reviews, we need to get back to a planning process that engages local communities while encouraging the need for the development of housing. A situation is developing where people’s voices are feeling very powerless and this process is not achieving what is needed. All the indications are that the SHD system is going to be replaced by something that is more restrictive in respect of the courts. We need to have a proper, open, democratic and robust planning decision process and have people buy-in to the delivery of houses. Most people do not want to oppose housing in their local communities or end up having to take judicial reviews but it is not unreasonable for them to be able to go through a process where they have some of their concerns listened to. If it is blatant NIMBYism, that will not be listened to because these concerns have to be within the parameters of the planning and development Acts. It is, however, reasonable for people to have a say on what is sustainable development in their local communities and it would be a regressive step if the one I am hearing about is the one we are going to take.