Seán Canney (Galway East, Independent)
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267. To ask the Minister for Housing, Planning, and Local Government his plans to introduce legislation to streamline the planning and judicial review process to ensure the full planning process can give statutory timelines and certainty to investors; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [41088/20]

Peter Burke (Longford-Westmeath, Fine Gael)
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The Programme for Government commits to the review and reform of the judicial review process so that such reforms come into effect upon the establishment of the proposed Environmental and Planning Law Court, while always adhering to EU law obligations on public participation under the Aarhus Convention.   The Housing and Planning and Development Bill 2019, the General Scheme for which was published in late 2019,  contains, inter alia, a range of proposals in this regard.

The General Scheme of the Bill is reflected in the Government's Legislation Programme Autumn Session 2020, among the list of the General Schemes to undergo pre-legislative scrutiny.   No arrangements have been set as yet for pre-legislative scrutiny of the General Scheme, but given the range of other legislation before the Joint Oireachtas Committee on Housing, Local Government and Heritage, this is not likely to arise until early 2021.

When a planning application is made to a planning authority, under section 34(8) of the Planning and Development Act 2000, as amended (the Act), the planning authority must make a decision within eight weeks of receiving a valid application where no further information is requested from the applicant. A decision of a planning authority on a planning application may be appealed to An Bord Pleanala within 4 weeks of the decision. Under section 126 of the Act, the Board has a statutory objective period of 18 weeks to make a decision on any appeal.

Where a decision is made by a planning authority or the Board, under section 50 of the Act an application for leave to apply for judicial review should be made within eight weeks of the date of the decision. The High Court shall not extend the eight week period for leave to apply for judicial review unless it considers that there is good and sufficient reason for doing so. Timelines within the courts are ones in which, I as Minister for Housing, Local Government and Heritage have no statutory function and are a matter for the Courts Service which is statutorily independent.