Eoin Ó Broin

Evan and Nadia Kavanagh and their three children are renters in Clondalkin. They are now at imminent risk of homelessness due to overholding on their notice of termination since 6 September. The landlord wants to sell to the local authority and applied through the tenant in situ scheme. The application was being processed and the landlord was then informed in July that because the funding had been…

Not for the tenant in situ scheme.

No additional funding has been provided for tenant in situ purchases.

It is just not correct, Taoiseach.

In the 11 years I have been an elected representative in Dublin Mid-West, every single year as the school term approaches, my office receives calls from desperate parents who do not believe their child will have a school place come September. This year has been no different. The parents do not come to us at the start of that battle, but near the end. They have spent months or, in some cases, years…

I thank the Cathaoirleach Gníomhach and the Minister. The Minister has now been in office for over six months and in my opinion, he has made some spectacularly bad policy decisions. The first, of course, was slashing funding for vital homeless prevention schemes like the tenant in situ scheme, Housing First and CAS acquisitions. The second was emasculating a very good suggestion from the Housing C…

The Minister is going to go down in history for having introduced a new principle of economics. It is called shrinkflation. It is the idea you can reduce the price of something by reducing the size of something. We are in the middle of a cost-of-living crisis. The price of milk has gone up almost 14% in the last year. Imagine a milk producer said people should not worry because producers are going…

I move amendment No. 1 to Seanad amendment No. 24: After subsection (1), to insert the following: "(1A) The holder of a permission shall notify the public of the application by way of a site notice. (1B) In order to ensure adherence with the State’s obligations under the Aarhus Convention and the principles of good planning and development the relevant authority shall provide for public partici…

Can I briefly comment?

I apologise to the Minister. I meant to say this on section 2. At some point during the Minister's responses to any of the clusters of amendments or the sections, it would be only right if he was able to give us any additional detail he has about the amendments he is intending to submit in the Seanad, that is, both the additional transitional amendments as well as the so-called permitted alteratio…

I move amendment No. 5: In page 11, between lines 19 and 20, to insert the following: “(e) The Minister may, by way of regulations, provide for third party observations for consideration by the planning authority to ensure compliance with the State’s obligations under the Aarhus Convention and the principles of good planning and development.”. I want to make a couple of general points on the pl…

That is precisely the problem. If this change to planning legislation had been included in the Planning and Development Act which we spent two years passing through the House, as a committee we could have asked, for example, planning law experts, professional planners and legal experts who specialise in Aarhus Convention compliance their views on this. One of the points I made on Second Stage was …

I move amendment No. 6: In page 11, between lines 19 and 20, to insert the following: “(e) The Minister may, in consultation with the Minister for Justice and with the approval of Cabinet, introduce regulations to place High Court good practice guidelines on a statutory footing in order to have legally binding statutory timelines for the hearing of Judicial Reviews and for the issuing of Court d…

I accept the technical explanation but would just make one point. I ask the Minister to examine the principle behind this amendment and to discuss it with the Minister for justice and also, in the course of his work as Minister for housing, with the relevant members of the Judiciary. We need to fix this bit of the system too. There is little value in having statutory timelines for decisions of the…

I will speak to my two amendments in this grouping. I said at the outset that we are not opposed in principle to a time-limited extension of duration. The challenge, however, is that there is no point giving somebody an extension of duration if they cannot demonstrate that something has changed and that what was previously unviable is now viable. I therefore think there needs to be some mechanism …

I move amendment No. 11: In page 12, between lines 23 and 24, to insert the following: “(b) an explanation as to why the development has not yet commenced, a viability assessment setting out what has changed that would allow the development to commence if an extension of duration is granted, and a detailed schedule of works setting out when the various stages of development will occur,”.

I move amendment No. 14: "In page 13, line 25, to delete “18 months” and substitute “6 months”."

I move amendment No. 15: In page 13, between lines 30 and 31, to insert the following: “(h) The Minister may, by way of regulations, provide for third party observations to the planning authority on any request for an extension of duration under this section. The regulations may include provision for: (i) the publication of public notices, on site, in newspapers and on digital platforms, of any…

I move amendment No. 16: In page 14, after line 18, to insert the following: “Report on planning permissions and residential units 18. Within three months of the passing of this Act, the Minister shall lay before the Houses of the Oireachtas a report detailing the number of planning permissions and residential units to which section 14 of this Act may apply and making recommendations on how to …

There is no enforcement of commencements. I understand the Minister's officials in the Department are liaising with local authorities with respect to determining whether developments that are availing of the development levy waiver and the water utility connection waiver are having a look at this. Local authorities do planning enforcement, but many do not even have the staff to do building control…

I move amendment No. 17: In page 14, after line 18, to insert the following: “Report on extensions 18. Every six months after the passing of this Act, the Minister shall lay before the Houses of the Oireachtas a report on the operation of the extension of duration detailing the number of developments that have availed of the extensions, the number of units granted extension that have commenced …

I move amendment No. 18: In page 14, after line 18, to insert the following: "Report on impact of Judicial Reviews 18. Within three months of the passing of this Act, the Minister shall lay before the Houses of the Oireachtas a report on the impact of Judicial Reviews on development including, critical infrastructure, renewable energy, public transport and residential development and setting ou…

I move amendment No. 19: In page 14, after line 18, to insert the following: "Report on compliance 18. Within three months of the passing of this Act, the Minister shall lay before the Houses of the Oireachtas a report on the compliance of all sections of this Act with the State’s obligations under the Aarhus Convention and the Environmental Impact Assessment Directive.".

Be careful what you wish for.

I thank the Leas-Cheann Comhairle. I am sharing time with Deputy Gould. When Deputy Darragh O'Brien was the Minister for housing and he launched a once-in-a-generation review on consolidation of the planning and development Acts, one of his main arguments was that the 2000 Act had been amended so many times that the legislation was unwieldy, too difficult to understand and overly complex and, the…