Infrastructure Bill is a dilution of democracy

IT SEEMS the Taoiseach Bertie Ahern is finally getting the powers he so vocally coveted on his recent visit to China.

I am referring to his desire to have the mandarin powers of the mayor of Shanghai.

Environment Minister Dick Roche’s new Infrastructure Bill is the embodiment of this further dilution of democracy and the removal of people from the planning process, not that they figure prominently in the current regime.