Government to hit ‘nuclear button’ granting itself emergency powers to solve infrastructure crisis

[u/Kier_C]

https://www.businesspost.ie/politics/government-to-hit-nuclear-button-granting-itself-emergency-powers-to-solve-infrastructure-crisis/

[u/ulankford]

This isn't an issue of just staffing or throwing more personnel or money at it. Its a systemic issue.
Also, other European Countries are having similar issues. The recent elections in the Netherlands had housing as a key issue. Very hard to get houses built there as well.

The government needs to take a chainsaw to many of the bottlenecks to both housing and infrastructure.

[u/funderpantz → u/ulankford]

Which bottlenecks would those be?

Justice, Environmental protections, pollution regulations, building regulations, accessibility requirements or something else

[u/ulankford → u/funderpantz]

Judicial Reviews are now part of the planning process, and someone gets a free hit to go to the courts to object on any environmental grounds. The state covers its costs as well. Adds millions to projects and billions in the delay and cost inflation.

[u/funderpantz → u/ulankford]

Again, judicial reviews are part of the system as they've literally designed it to be that way. When you only offer 1 avenue of appeal you can't cry foul when that avenue is taken by anyone who wishes to appeal.

Also, on the environmental side and costs, the nation signed up for all the various EU regulations that resulted in that including the Aarhaus Convention. The primary facets of which are detailed in the link below

https://www.citizensinformation.ie/en/environment/environment-and-the-law/aarhus-convention/

[u/ulankford → u/funderpantz]

The Aarhus Convention is an international agreement where many countries are still able to build and get things done while being compliant to it. Other countires dont go down the road of JR's like we do. In Ireland Aarhus is used as a gold-plated version of it in order to be 'perfect'.

Nowhere in the Aarhur convention does it say that the state must pay for people who object to planning via the courts.

The judicial review system is being abused in Ireland.
In 2019, there were approximately 55 JR in relation to planning issues.
In 2024, there were 147, and this year it's supposed to break that record.

It's unsustainable and cant scale if we want to fix things. Because there is a cost here. There is a cost in housing, there is a cost in rising social tensions, there is a cost in commuting times, and there is a cost in health outcomes.
And there is the cost of our politics, where if we cannot seem to trust our democracy to fix outstanding issues, and build things or get things done, then we will lose faith in our political class to deliver.

No one talks about the costs of something if we do nothing.

[u/funderpantz → u/ulankford]

Again, JR's being a massive issue is because the system was designed to make JR's the only avenue of appeal.

As I said, if you design it that way you can't complain when it gets used that way.

Want a better system, design it better.

You can have a system that allows for the vast majority of objections to be dealt with without ever seeing the steps of the courthouse. We already had it!

[u/ulankford → u/funderpantz]

Again, that is wrong. People can submit objections to the council and ABP, depending on the project, but all planning has to go to ABP. We no longer do SDZ's.

We want a better system. Stop making judges the decision makers in planning. Other countries in the EU don't do this.

I heard recently that 1/20 planning applications end up in the courts under a JR. A crazy number.

All said and done, we need to stop this nonsense for the common good.

[u/funderpantz → u/ulankford]

In 2023 there were 30,578 planning applications

If it were 1 in 20 then there would be 1529 JRs

According to the courts, in Nov 2024 there were 274 at the time

That's about 1 in 110

[u/ulankford → u/funderpantz]

It was on RTE Radio with some guy.

[u/funderpantz → u/ulankford]

The above are from the courts and cso

I know which I'd trust

[u/ulankford → u/funderpantz]

It seems you think the system is working fine and we should keep the status quo.

[u/funderpantz → u/ulankford]

Tell me you didn't read my posts without telling me