New law will make it harder to hold up housing and infrastructure projects

Jim O'Callaghan was speaking at the annual Liam Lynch commemoration in Fermoy, Co Cork, on Sunday. Picture: Brian Lawless/PA

Minister for justice Jim O’Callaghan has said new legislation is being prepared to make it harder for individuals or groups to take judicial reviews which hold up housing and infrastructure projects.

Speaking at the annual Liam Lynch commemoration in Fermoy, Co Cork, Mr O’Callaghan said the challenges the State faces to deliver housing “are being compounded by the utilisation of our laws, in certain circumstances, to delay, obfuscate, and undermine the efficient delivery".

“In particular, the utilisation of judicial reviews to prevent the delivery of vital accommodation, transport, or environmental projects because of technical breaches of statutory rules or procedure is abhorrent to the common good,” he said, adding: 

Our increasingly impactful and expansive judicial review process must be curtailed. 

He has asked his officials to “bring forward proposals to rebalance the judicial review procedure to ensure the common good and public interest are at the centre of any judicial review process".

“Fianna Fáil, the Taoiseach, and its ministers believe in homeownership to advance the social and economic welfare our people. The laws of our Republic must serve our people, not act as barriers to their progress,” Mr O’Callaghan said.

“In any republic, laws are there to serve the common good and the people who put them in place through their democratically elected representatives. 

"They shouldn't be viewed as a game that can be won or lost depending on absolute compliance with our ever-growing statutory architecture or rules of procedure,” he added.