Waste management plans will now take priority over county development plans, Labour's environment spokesman claimed last night as controversial legislation was passed in the Dáil.
Mr Eamon Gilmore said the Protection of the Environment Bill would "come to haunt" the Government when householders, the motor trade and local communities came to realise its impact. He said two major amendments made the Bill even more unacceptable than it already was.
The amendment on waste management was the "most significant change in planning law" and would mean that the county and city managers would determine where a waste incinerator would go. "A county manager proposing a waste facility can have that facility supersede the county development plan made by his elected members," he said.
The controversial legislation, which transposes EU policy on waste into Irish law, transfers the power to set refuse charge fees from councillors to the county manager, and will allow local authorities not to collect rubbish if householders refuse to pay waste charges.
But the Minister, Mr Cullen, said the waste management provision was done because one local authority used its own development plan to "absolutely sunder and shred the waste management plan that was in place". They had been advised that it was "against good planning", but they still went ahead with it, he said. There was no more "playing cat and mouse" with waste management, he said. There was a crisis and it was time to deal with it.
Waste management strategies were in place, including the use of waste incinerators and "backdoor attempts", could not be allowed to "scupper" plans to deal on a national and regional basis with waste.
Mr Gilmore also criticised an eight-page long amendment on the recovery of "end-of-life" vehicles. This effectively amounted to new legislation. It was based on an EU directive, signed three years ago. Mr Cullen said these amendments were not new that the issues were "out there" for some time and he was faced with dealing with them.
