Sir, – There is some irony that comments to the Oireachtas banking inquiry indicating that bullish planners fuelled the boom came on the same day that the Taoiseach was quoted as urging Longford County Council to “get it right” when a planning application for a holiday village comes before it (April 2nd).
It should no longer be acceptable to single out and blame the planning profession for the housing bubble while elsewhere urging it to approve development before a planning application has even been made. It should also be no longer acceptable that the term “planner” is randomly used as a label to describe “all” those involved in the planning process, including administrators, lobbyists and other professions. The professional planner must be clearly defined.
Proper planning looks at each application on its merits and means that no project should be approved if it is socially, economically or environmentally inappropriate or cannot be made sound. That is the lesson planners have learned from our mistakes of the recent past and is a test that commentators and others must remember. – Yours, etc,
MARY HUGHES,
President,
Irish Planning Institute,
Great Strand Street,
Dublin 1.