Roche to publish IKEA proposals

The Minister for the Environment Dick Roche is to publish proposals which would allow Swedish furniture store IKEA to open its first outlet in Ireland.

Mr Roche is in favour of amending existing planning guidelines to let the giant warehouse retailer in.

IKEA would be able to build a store four times the size of anything currently trading here in a designated area of regeneration.

But Tara Buckley of the independent retailer's group RGDATA is against it.

“IKEA has smaller stores in lots of other countries. In Australia, in France, just as recently as 2003 it opened a store that was smaller than the retail cap here so we do not understand why IKEA can't locate in Ireland within the guidelines.”