Eoin Ó Broin (Dublin Mid West, Sinn Fein)
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1179. To ask the Minister for Housing, Planning, and Local Government to provide a list of all land that had its residential zoning by way of ministerial order in each of the years since 2020, by local authority area and land volume. [18977/25]

James Browne (Wexford, Fianna Fail)
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The zoning of land for particular purposes, including housing, is an exercise undertaken by planning authorities as part of their overall statutory plan function generally as part of a development plan under sections 9 to 13 of the Planning and Development Act, 2000 (as amended), but can at present also be carried out as part of a local area plan (LAP) process. The making of a development plan or an LAP is a reserved function of the elected members of each authority; there is no provision within the Planning and Development Act 2000 (as amended) that involves the zoning of land by Ministerial Order.

In preparing their statutory plans, including in relation to the zoning of land for particular purposes, the elected members are required to consider and be consistent with or have regard to, as appropriate, the established statutory national and regional planning policy and legislation, including as identified in the National Planning Framework, Regional Spatial and Economic Strategies and relevant Ministerial planning guidelines. Of particular relevance to the matter of development plans and zoning are the Ministerial Guidelines issued in 2022, the Development Plans Guidelines for Planning Authorities.

The Office of the Planning Regulator (OPR) was formally established in April 2019 under the Act and one of the core functions of the Office is to undertake the independent evaluation of statutory plans to ensure that such plans under preparation are consistent with national and regional planning policy and legislation, as required by the Act. Where necessary to ensure such consistency, the Office may recommend to the Minister for Housing, Local Government and Heritage that a direction should be issued to a local authority to make certain changes to the plan.

The OPR website contains information in relation to Section 31 Directions issued further to a recommendation received from the Office: www.opr.ie/