Mick Clifford: Midleton rezoning row highlights the weaknesses in Ireland's planning system

'Unprecedented' hundreds of submissions oppose this site's zoning as green belt. Yet a local rep says she's never met any of them. And it will all be decided by councillors up to 160km away

This land adjacent to Blossom Hill in Broomfield,  Midleton, Co Cork, is the focus of an extraordinary campaign of hundreds of submissions for and against its rezoning. Picture: Dan Linehan

Magdalena Persinska wants to come home to Midleton.

“I have been searching for sometime to buy a house near Midleton Town as I wish to move back to Midleton from Poland,” she wrote in a submission to Cork County Council. “I have been finding it extremely difficult to secure a new home for my family as there is nothing available to buy which came as a big shock.”