Failure to implement the 30-year-old Kenny report on building land was criticised by Mr Ciaran Cuffe (Green Party, Dún Laoghaire) during a debate on a Green Party Private Member's Bill on planning.
"Sadly it has sat on the shelf for the last 30 years, and we have not, sadly, seen the implementation of many of the fine recommendations of that report," said Mr Cuffe.
He added that the report had expressed concern at the profits accruing to developers from the sale of building land, and the words back then are very similar to the words which could be used today to describe the position not alone in the greater Dublin area but on the outskirts of many towns and cities. "It is wrong that the enormous profits from land rezoning are accruing for the most part to a very limited group of developers," he added.
Introducing the Planning and Development (Amendment) Bill 2003, Mr Dan Boyle (Green Party, Cork South Central) said that there should be no variation of a development plan without a two-thirds majority of a local authority.
The Minister of State for the Environment, Mr Noel Ahern, said the Bill was misconceived and the Government would oppose it.
The Fine Gael spokesman on the environment, Mr Bernard Allen, said the Bill went a long way to help bring into being many of the recommendations in the CORI submission to the All Party Committee on the Constitution.
Debate on the Bill continues tonight.
