Planning and Development (Amendment) Bill 2026: Committee and Remaining Stages
Dail Éireann — 2026-07-08
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John Cummins (FG), Waterford

I thank the Deputies. As a general point, my priority is to ensure the Planning and Development Act 2024 is enabled and that we have all provisions in force before the end of this year. To do that, I have to pass legislation that will enable the transitionary pieces to occur. That is the purpose of the Bill before us. If I cannot progress this to conclusion, it means a further delay in the implementation of the substantive Act, which both the Deputy and I spent a considerable period of our lives in the committee room downstairs debating during the previous parliamentary term.
In relation to the specific amendment tabled by Deputies Ó Broin and Gould, it seeks to lay a report before the Houses of the Oireachtas every six months detailing the impact of the amendments to Part 4 of the principal Act relating to alterations of existing planning permissions and detailing the location, nature and volume of such alterations by project and local authority area, and the resulting commencement of developments which have secured the alterations. I am not in a position to accept the amendment. I consider a statutory requirement to produce such a report every six months to be entirely excessive. The reason I say that is this is a time-bound measure contained in section 138A. It is a two-year period. It is not something that is going to go on in perpetuity. There may be value in what some of the Deputies are saying were this an in-perpetuity discussion. It is time-bound in nature and as a result, I cannot accept the amendment.

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Retrieved: 2026-09-14T01:01:07+00:00
Sitting date: 2026-07-08