Planning bill does not comply with international convention, senator tells junior Housing Minister

Senator Alice Mary Higgins (pictured) took umbrage with Mr Dillon’s insistence that the Bill, which Minister for Housing Darragh O’Brien had previously said he wished to see enacted before the summer “come hell or high water”, “is compliant with the Aarhus Convention”. File photo: Gareth Chaney/Collins

The Government has been criticised for claiming repeatedly under Dáil privilege that its new Planning Bill is compliant with an international convention.

The 700-page Planning and Development Bill, which was guillotined through the Dáil last month, is currently being debated at committee stage in the Seanad, with the Government planning to vote on it for a final time in September.

During the debate with junior Housing Minister Alan Dillon, independent senator Alice Mary Higgins took umbrage with Mr Dillon’s insistence that the Bill, which Minister for Housing Darragh O’Brien had previously said he wished to see enacted before the summer “come hell or high water”, “is compliant with the Aarhus Convention”.

Responding to Ms Higgins’ proposal that the Government report within three months of the Bill being enacted as to how it complies with Aarhus, Mr Dillon said he could not “see the need to report on this matter in the manner suggested”.

The 1998 UN convention, of which Ireland is a signatory, aims to defend the right of public participation in legislative matters and the right of access to justice — such as judicial review.

Last month, the Aarhus Convention Compliance Committee informed the Department of the Environment that the new Bill is not compliant with the convention in terms of how it allows for public oversight of the extension of planning permissions.

The Irish Examiner previously reported that the Department of Housing, queried regarding the ACCC’s unfavourable progress report, had acknowledged that it was “consulting” with the office of the Attorney General on the matter.

Addressing the issue in the Seanad, Ms Higgins said Mr Dillon’s insistence during the debate that the Bill is compliant is “not correct”.

She said regarding the minister’s assertions:

To have the audacity to stand and say it is compliant when it is not is pretty poor, wrong and quite disrespectful, honestly, to the house.

“Will the Government be happy to stand over that? It will create significant issues internationally,” she said adding: “When one gets it wrong, one does not get to bludgeon over it. It creates chaos.”

Mr Dillon acknowledged that the Aarhus matter “is currently with the office of the Attorney General” adding that his department has given its “commitment” to responding to the Aarhus committee by September.

Ms Higgins said that rather than seeking to fix problems with the Bill upon its likely enactment in September, it should rather be delayed until October in order “to get the legislation right, rather than blundering ahead with a Bill that is wrong, while trying to run interference on anyone who might call the Government out on it in the courts”.

She further criticised the decision to debate the Bill “when a clear issue is still up in the air and still to be solved”.