Victor Boyhan (Independent)

I will continue on from what Senator McDowell was saying about this particular juncture we are at. I will share some thoughts. I am conscious of time and do not want to waste too much today. I am conscious I have no amendments myself but I intend to contribute to some of the amendments. I have certainly collaborated with a number of people. I do not believe everything I read in the print media but I buy the Business Post on Sunday. It is an excellent paper that focuses particularly on a lot of planning and real estate issues. If you were to believe some of the articles in it, which are attributed to a number of people, you would certainly be scratching your head and asking what is really going on. I will share what was said by Gavin Lawlor, president of the Irish Planning Institute, IPI, of which many of the Minister of State's staff are members, be they officials in the Department or our local authorities. I have spoken to a number of chief executives in local authorities. I have spoken to many of our city and county councillors. One might ask what city and county councillors have to do with it. They are the guardians of their city and county development plans. Of course, we were told that this famous Planning and Development Act 2024 would be the panacea for everything in planning. We do not have a completed version of this, and I hope the Minister of State will touch on that because we need an answer at this point. Remember, the citizens of this State can litigate as Gaeilge. That is their constitutional right. After all of this time, are we to believe or to be told that nobody has the capacity, will, or resources to translate this critical and important legislation into our native language? We want an answer to that. We also want to know when it will happen. That is the first thing.

Second, Gavin Lawlor, president of the IPI stated, "While we all share the Minister’s priorities of bringing development costs down and accelerating housing delivery, we are not convinced that the announced changes will achieve what’s intended." He is of course referring to the Planning and Development (Amendment) Bill 2025 that we are considering now. Gavin Lawlor issued a formal press release that has been covered extensively in the media. He states:

Professional planners not only recognise the gravity of the housing crisis - we are actively working to be part of the solution. We welcome meaningful, evidence-based reforms that support the accelerated, coordinated, and sustainable delivery of apartments and homes in communities across the country. While we all share the Minister’s priorities of bringing development costs down and accelerating housing delivery, we are not convinced that the announced changes will achieve what’s intended. In particular, the erosion of unit mix requirements represents a market-led approach to housing that is fundamentally at odds with the significant work undertaken by the Department of Housing to date to create a plan-led system.

I go back to that plan-led system. The Minister of State, Deputy Cummins, will remember this because he was sitting in this Chamber then. In our development plan, the whole emphasis was, as we were told by the then Minister and Ministers of State that this was moving from a developer-led system. There were suggestions, assertions and aspersions about developers and what they may or may not have been up to. I do not subscribe to them, so I put that to one side. We were told this would now be planning-led development. What I want to say is that I am deeply concerned. The IPI states "Our members understand the motivation to make unviable housing projects deliverable, however our members are deeply concerned about the potential unintended consequences of the Minister’s actions." I talk to chief executives around the country and many of them are aghast. It is not all of them, some of them I did not get to speak to. I had reason to be at two local authorities in Dublin yesterday. I spoke to people there. They just cannot understand it. The Land Development Agency seems to know more than anyone about what is going on. Of course, it has a lot to gain. I am a supporter of the Land Development Agency. I do not have an issue with the Land Development Agency. I want to share two stories before I close. I am absolutely against the idea of single aspects. If you face north, you will have to use energy. We are talking about sustainable development. You will have to use energy to heat them up. If you face south, for the past two weeks, you would have had to have energy to cool them down. This is not sustainable planning. It is not proper and sustainable development - end of story. I spoke to a man last week who told me he lived in the Fingal County Council area. He ended up buying accommodation.He told me the price and the repayments were a little more than €1,000 per month. I said "Oh, that sounds like great value.". It was local authority or private arrangement partnership funding mechanism. I did not quite know the funding mechanism. The point is his repayments were €1,050 per month. I asked him how many rooms he had and he told me he had no rooms. He was living in a studio. He was married and 37 years of age. His wife was 38. They were not able to have a family at the moment. He said the other day he got a knock on his bathroom door. It was his wife and she asked him if he was okay in there because she had not heard the water. He said no, he was in there reading a book. That paints a picture. It paints a picture that the only room to break away from someone else for a couple who are stuck, because that was all they could afford, is in this room. Quite frankly, that is not the way we should be going. There is a place for studio apartments but not for single aspect.

I will finish on that and look forward to contributing to the debate. There are serious concerns and shortcomings. The Minister of State knows there has been no regulatory impact assessment of this Bill. He knows the committee waived pre-legislative scrutiny; it is the right of any committee to waive, but that does not mean anything. It just means the Government wrote to the committee to ask whether it would waive pre-legislative scrutiny. It did in this case, which is its right, and I respect that right. That was a pity too.

We are talking about this being emergency legislation. The timing of this legislation as it kicks in will be critical because the Government has given notice to developers of this legislation. I do not know the extent of the notice given but there certainly has been now. We have no guarantee. Many sections of the 2024 Act have not commenced. What assurances do we have? I note there is no emergency request for the President to sign this legislation as of yet. If this Bill passes the Houses this week, when will it be signed by the President? What is the Government's intention? When will it be fully, not partly, enacted? Timing is of the essence with this legislation.

In summary, this is unsatisfactory. I cannot see how many Members will support this legislation. We can spend all night pointing out the shortcomings or we can engage in a meaningful way, have our votes, make our points and ultimately, vote on this legislation, which will clearly happen tonight.