Michael McGrath (Cork South Central, Fianna Fail)
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Question 363: To ask the Minister for the Environment, Heritage and Local Government if local authorities had the legal power prior to 2000 under planning legislation to amend a development boundary and remove a site from a development zone which had previously been within the boundary. [11534/10]

John Gormley (Dublin South East, Green Party)
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The making of development plans has been a reserved function of the locally elected members of planning authorities since the introduction of planning legislation in 1963. In making a development plan under current and previous legislation, it has been a matter for the elected members to decide the allocation of specific development plan objectives for the use of land for specific purposes, otherwise known as zoning, whether in urban or rural areas. Under previous and current planning legislation, it was and remains a matter for locally elected members of a planning authority to decide whether lands lie inside or outside the development boundaries of specific places or areas at the time of making the development plan concerned. The Planning and Development Act 2000 introduced a further provision under Section 10 (8) to clarify that there is no presumption in law that any land zoned in a particular development plan (including a development plan that has been varied) should remain so zoned in any subsequent development plan.