Malcolm Byrne (Wicklow-Wexford, Fianna Fail)
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316. To ask the Minister for Housing, Planning, and Local Government his plans to publish a comparative league table of local authorities’ performance with regard to housing delivery; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [68584/25]

James Browne (Wexford, Fianna Fail)
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My Department publishes comprehensive programme-level statistics on a quarterly basis on social and affordable housing delivery activity by local authorities and Approved Housing Bodies (AHBs) in each local authority, on a local authority basis. Data on social housing delivery and performance against target is also published.

This data is available to the end of Q2 2025 and is published on the statistics page of my Department’s website at the following link: www.gov.ie/en/collection/6060e-overall-social-housing-provision/.

Further housing data, including data on planning permissions, commencements and new dwelling completions is published by the Central Statistics Office (CSO) on a quarterly basis and is available on the CSO website at: www.cso.ie/en/releasesandpublications/hubs/p-hh/housinghub/.

Malcolm Byrne (Wicklow-Wexford, Fianna Fail)
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317. To ask the Minister for Housing, Planning, and Local Government the number of planners currently employed by each local authority; the number of posts that are currently vacant; the measures which are in place to attract more planners to local authorities; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [68585/25]

James Browne (Wexford, Fianna Fail)
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Under Section 159 of the Local Government Act 2001, each Chief Executive is responsible for the staffing and organisational arrangements necessary for carrying out the functions of the local authority for which he or she is responsible. My Department oversees workforce planning for the local government sector, including the monitoring of local government sector employment levels. To this end, my Department gathers aggregate quarterly data on staff numbers in each local authority on a whole time equivalent basis. However, granular data, in terms of the numbers of staff assigned to specific work areas or the number of vacancies in each local authority, is not collected and consequently is not available in my Department. The relevant information would be available from each local authority.

On 15 October 2024, my Department published a Ministerial Action Plan on Planning Resources to respond to capacity challenges in the planning sector. This Action Plan provides a detailed roadmap to increase the pool of planning and related expertise needed to ensure a planning system fit for future needs. It sets out 14 high-level actions that provide a coordinated pathway to ensure a sustainable pipeline of planning and related expertise into the future, addressing the areas of education, recruitment and retention, as well as measures to encourage greater innovation and efficiency.

Funding was secured in Budget 2025 to support delivery of the Action Plan and a Steering Group established to coordinate and oversee the development of this Action Plan will remain in place to oversee the implementation and ongoing review of the Action Plan.

My Department is currently working on a number of measures to increase staffing levels in the local government planning sector. In this regard, my Department is collaborating with the local government sector and key stakeholders on the delivery of a programme of supports to planning authorities. These supports include the provision of staffing resources and expertise to enable planning authorities to perform their functions efficiently and effectively.

In October 2023, approval was conveyed for the filling of an initial 101 posts in the local authority planning sector under the first tranche of a programme of supports for planning resources. A further approval issued in January 2025 for 112 posts - 56 graduate planner posts and 56 staff officer posts - to support the Planning function within local authorities.

Currently, engagement is taking place regarding a business case received by the LGMA for phase 3 of supports for further planning positions within the local government sector. Details of this third tranche should be finalised shortly.

On 13 May 2025, a national recruitment campaign was launched to attract graduate planners into Ireland’s local authorities (Action 4 of the Ministerial Action Plan), which was supported by my Department. Regional interviews were held in late July and the filling of these posts are nearing completion.

The occupation of town planner has also been added to the Critical Skills Occupation List (Action 9 of the Ministerial Action Plan) which will allow eligible non-EEA professionals from outside of Europe to now benefit from streamlined employment permit processes, making it easier for Irish employers to recruit and retain international talent in this vital sector. This addition is a decisive step to addressing planning resource shortages and reinforcing the capacity of our planning system to help meet current and future needs.