Rural Planning: Statements Seanad Éireann — 2026-06-10 ============================================================ Christopher O'Sullivan (FF), Cork South-West I thank everybody for their contributions. I was not taking notes but I was taking mental notes and listening to it all. Fortunately, it is all recorded so we can watch it back. I thank Senators for giving me the opportunity to discuss rural planning, further to the important discussions on this topic in the House today. The draft national planning statement is being prepared and will provide more clarity and certainty to those engaging with the planning system and seeking to build a new rural dwelling. The importance of delivering on the needs of rural communities is acknowledged, especially through the supply of housing that meets the need of people who can demonstrate they have a local housing need to live or work in that rural area, based on economic or social considerations. Nationally, rural housing continues to be an important component of overall new housing delivery, with about 4,000 or 5,000 new rural dwellings being built annually. The Government is progressing a range of planning and housing actions contained within its housing action plan that will support the delivery of housing across the country. An example of this is the launch of the housing infrastructure investment fund by the housing activation office. This provides significant investment in social and affordable housing along with funding schemes to support the reuse of vacant and derelict properties. My Department is also working with Uisce Éireann and local authorities to address water and wastewater infrastructure needs in rural areas, including Gaeltacht communities. Investment through the rural water programme helps support safe drinking water, improved wastewater services and the delivery of housing in these areas. These measures help ensure essential infrastructure keeps pace with housing needs and supports long-term community resilience. The national planning framework complements and builds on existing Government policy set out in Our Rural Future: Rural Development Policy 2021-2025 and Our Living Islands: National Islands Policy 2023-2033. In recognising the unique characteristics of our island communities, which include Gaeltacht islands, a number of measures have been implemented through the our living islands policy. These include subsidised cargo ferry services to offshore islands to support the carriage of construction machinery and materials, and funding for community development companies and capital investment in community infrastructure on islands. In addition, enhanced support under the vacant property refurbishment grant is available to assist the refurbishment of vacant and derelict properties on qualifying islands to help bring them back into use as homes. The maximum grant amount is 20% higher in recognition of the additional costs involved in construction on offshore islands. Up to €60,000, compared with €50,000 on the mainland, is available for refurbishing vacant properties, with up to €84,000, compared with €70,000 on the mainland, where the property is derelict. Officials within my Department also continue to work closely with officials in the Department of Rural and Community Development and the Gaeltacht, local authorities and Údarás na Gaeltachta in supporting the provision of housing and infrastructure in Gaeltacht communities. That is the gist of it. Obviously in today's statements we could not go into in-depth detail about what may be in the draft national planning statement, but that draft will emerge very shortly. The Minister, the Minister of State, Deputy Cummins, and I have been working on this to ensure the input is appropriate. There is a stated aim. The Minister of State, Deputy Cummins, mentioned that, in a rural area suffering persistent and substantial population decline, the policy is to accommodate anyone who is looking to build a house. I want to focus on the word "accommodate". That is exactly what we need to do when it comes to planning in rural areas. We need to accommodate people rather than blocking them and putting obstacles in their way. It is essential. Take a newly married couple who, perhaps, have just had a child and are applying for planning permission. We cannot have a situation where that couple are contacting Senators' offices and crying down the phone because they have been refused for the third or fourth time. We have all seen at first hand the cost, the distress and the emotional impact of something like that. If we are successful with this planning statement, that success will look like not having those types of situations. It will mean connection to an area does not mean you have to have been born in the field where the site is, or maybe the field next to it, or in that postcode but rather the community you are part of, that you grew up in, played sports in, went to school in and worked in. We need clarity and flexibility when it comes to interpreting that. It means if you have a bit of a landholding and there are a number of sites, you are not expecting to get permission to build on the top of the tallest hill there but we cannot be sending people down to the lowest, darkest, deepest hole either. That is what success looks like if we get this national planning statement right. It means that there is flexibility. At the end of the day, the applicants are going to be living in this house for the rest of their lives. Acknowledging the fact that it is the applicants who are going to be living in these homes, they should have more of an input into design. All too often we see situations where people had their dream home but perhaps it is out of character with the landscape. There has to be reason there as well because at the end of the day, it is the applicants who are going to be living there and they have to be happy with the house that has been designed. Another issues is where the applicant is already living on a road, perhaps with their parents, and using that road but they are being turned down because of road traffic safety concerns. These are the issues that this national planning statement provides us with an opportunity to provide clarity on. Working with the Minister, Deputy Browne, and the Minister of State, Deputy Cummins, that is the direction of travel. We want to ensure clarity and consistency and that we accommodate. Let that be the key word, that we accommodate applicants rather than put up barriers. I will touch now on the islands, which I referenced in my speech. The islands are different. We talk about school depopulation and the fear of the closure of schools. On islands in particular, that is a real and acute concern. Cape Clear is a Gaeltacht island in west Cork. It is one of the most beautiful places one will ever visit and I urge Senators to go there but the school is just barely hanging on. They had a very innovative idea known as gateway housing, which was trialled in the Hebrides in Scotland, whereby the islanders, the comharchumann, or the community, were allowed to build four to six houses to allow people to try out island life for a while and if they liked it, they stayed. Future populations would then keep the businesses and the schools going. That is something I would love to see reflected in this as well. The details will emerge shortly but this is one of the greatest hopes and chances we have ever had to ease the burden, stress and strain, not just on young people but on people of all ages and backgrounds and allow them to live in their area or an area to which they have a connection, whether that is where they work or live or where they were born. I thank all Senators for their comments which were very helpful. What is clear is that we have all had very similar experiences and this is a chance to fix that. --- Source: Houses of the Oireachtas. Licensed under CC BY 4.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/). The Official Report is revised after first publication; the fetch timestamp below identifies the version quoted. Record URI: https://data.oireachtas.ie/akn/ie/debateRecord/seanad/2026-06-10/debate/main Retrieved: 2026-08-14T04:55:02+00:00 Sitting date: 2026-06-10