Government accused of delaying National Planning Framework update to avoid political fall-out

Last January, Conor O’Connell, director of housing and planning with the Construction Industry Federation, said the “big issue facing us all” in terms of housing “remains the inadequate growth projections contained in the National Planning Framework”, adding that his hope for the 2024 revision was that it would “allow for more zoned land to cater for the increased housing that is required”. File photo: Yui Mok/PA

The Government has been accused of deliberately delaying an update to the National Planning Framework (NPF) until after this summer’s local elections in order to minimise the political fall-out from its publication.

On Tuesday, the Department of Housing said that the latest revision to the NPF, which was due to be published next month and which would see housing targets redefined for each county, would now not emerge until September 2024.