Madam, - I have read with interest the debate in these columns in recent weeks concerning planning and rural housing, containing as it does a mixture of fact, misconception and myth.
As a planner who worked in a number of English local authorities for many years, and is now working for a planning authority in the west of Ireland, I consider that some of your correspondents have missed the point.
Decisions on planning applications are not made in a vacuum. Rather, planning authorities are required under the legislation to consider the proper planning and sustainable development of an area and to have regard to the provisions of the development plan, ministerial guidelines and government policies.
The latest ministerial guidelines were issued in March 2004 and are concerned with sustainable rural housing. While they are still a consultation draft, the Minister for the Environment, Heritage and Local Government has requested that local authorities implement them speedily and effectively.
I commend your readers with an interest in this topic to read these guidelines if they have not already done so.
Planning decisions are not made against the background of alien ideologies but result from careful evaluation by qualified and dedicated planning staff of all the relevant issues relating to each application. These include legislation and policies at both national and local levels, which have been prepared in the context and through the mechanisms of a modern democratic society. - Yours, etc.,
BILL SANSOM, Ballycar Road, Newmarket On Fergus, Co Clare.