When will planning offices be held to account?

AS the new minister of state with responsibility for planning, I would like to ask Ciarán Cuffe if there is going to be any form of accountability put in place in local authority planning departments.

It is obvious that huge mistakes were made in allowing developments take place in areas that have now become ghost estates, and responsibility for this has to be with the planners who allowed it to happen.

Development companies are profit-driven and will build anywhere. Planners are supposed to act in the wider social interest. They did not.

I am tired of hearing public servants repeatedly crying, “we didn’t cause the mess but now we’re taking all the pain”.

Their rejection of a deal that sees their jobs secure for life and their wages secured for four years in a dwindling economy is infuriating.

I hope that if those responsible for bad planning in the past cannot be held accountable, then at least a system will be put in place to ensure they are answerable in future.

John O’Gorman

Upper John Street

Cork