Sir, – I would like to remind Minister for Housing Eoghan Murphy that Ireland is a democracy, in light of his recent remarks to the 2019 Planning Conference (News, April 6th).
The fast-track Strategic Housing Development (SHD) scheme introduced by him purports to address homelessness and the housing crisis as one of the pillars of the Government strategy Rebuilding Ireland.
Planning applications for developments under the SHD are made directly to An Bord Pleanála, and not to a local planning authority, with a right of appeal to An Bord Pleanála.
This one-stop process significantly reduces the role of the general public in the planning process. It also dilutes the role of the democratically elected representatives of the public, councillors at local level.
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The only recourse to the public objecting to developments in their area is by way of judicial review which will only deal with points of law. The process of judicial review does not allow other serious concerns of the public to be addressed. The disregard for third-party opinion is undemocratic.
I am affronted by the Minister’s assertion that objecting to undesirable developments for a variety of serious concerns is to be construed as making “vexatious complaints”.
I would like him to give some concrete examples of complaints he considers “vexatious”. I am worried that the Minister construes all objections as gratuitous.
It is alarming that Mr Murphy suggests that politicians should not represent their constituents in planning matters and that he is thinking of introducing legislation to prevent them doing so. This is also an erosion of democracy.
Developing schemes of large numbers of overpriced apartments designed for the buy-to-let market and justified by the inclusion of paltry amounts of social housing is a travesty of the purported function of the SHD.
Such schemes will do very little to address the housing crisis nor will they alleviate homelessness. What they will do is line the pockets of developers.
Perhaps by “vexatious” the Minister means those that point out the many deficiencies of his housing policy.
I know many share my views, and that these views will inform our choices when it comes to voting in the forthcoming European and local elections. – Yours, etc,
ADRIENNE QUINN,
Blackrock,
Co Dublin.