I would love the Minister to answer the question. I invite him to do so.

I wish to share time with some colleagues.

I thank the Rural Independents for tabling this Bill and giving us an opportunity to have an important debate about housing and planning in rural Ireland. The housing crisis is as deep in rural Ireland as it is in urban Ireland. Deputy O'Donoghue and I often speak about this in committee. There is a real challenge in islands, rural Gaeltachtaí, and in those rural areas experiencing population stagnation and decline. Small and medium size builders are not building. They cannot get finance or serviced land and it tak…

I am genuinely making these comments respectfully, as I accept the Deputies are raising these issues because they passionately believe in fixing planning and housing in rural Ireland, as I do. In fact, the Bill will not affect An Taisce's funding, because the funding it gets from the Government is not for its planning work. It gets no direct funding from the State for any of its planning work or advocacy, it gets it for very specific programmes. For example, it runs the annual national spring clean programme, which…

As the Minister is aware, yesterday on Second Stage I indicated that I am not opposed to the Bill in principle, but I raised a concern about whether it could lead to involuntary sharing of accommodation after an initial period of sharing. Is that something the Minister looked at or considered during the drafting and consideration of this section? If not, is it something he will give serious consideration to prior to the enactment of the Bill? While I have no issue at all with two people being regarded as two separa…

This is one of the sections of the Bill I was referring to yesterday when I said it would have been preferable if this had gone through the ordinary legislative process. If I may, I will take a second to highlight the particular concern. Why have cost rental landlords like the LDA asked for this provision? It is something they have been very open about in their conversations with many of us, and there is no criticism of them for asking. The first reason is that a single-person household currently cannot actually af…

I will not stop on each of these sections but I would like to ask a couple of questions further to my comments yesterday around the allocation scheme. I appreciate there is a lot of work to do on this with respect to the regulations. Subject, of course, to the Oireachtas still being sitting, perhaps there could be some mechanism for the Oireachtas joint committee to be consulted even informally on that, be it through a private briefing or committee meeting. As the Minister knows, many of us have experience of how a…

No. We are a very reasonable bunch of people on this side of the House.

On a point of order, to be helpful, when speaking on the Government amendments, the Minister might address our amendments to the amendments. That will allow us to get through the work a bit more quickly.

I have submitted a number of amendments to Seanad amendment No. 2. We have three hours to go through 175 pages of amendments. Some of the amendments are relatively straightforward and technical in nature but many of them are not. Many substantively change key aspects of the legislation. Late last night, we received another eight pages of substitute amendments, one of which is the second amendment in this group, which I will come to in a moment. While the Seanad dealt with some of the amendments, it did not manage t…

I apologise.

I will deal directly with the Minister's response to my queries, specifically in respect of amendment No. 2, but it is important to correct the record of the Dáil on the Minister's timeline. He gave the impression some of us on this side of the House said the legislation had been rushed. In fact, in my remarks I made it very clear Committee Stage was done entirely appropriately thanks to the leadership of the Chair of the committee, Deputy Matthews, as well as the decisions of the committee. The charge is that the …

I move amendment No. 1 to Seanad amendment No. 2: In subsection (3), after “ subsection (4) ”, to insert “ and subsection (6) ”.

I move amendment No. 2 to Seanad amendment No. 2: After subsection (3), to insert the following: “(4) Except in the case of Part 24 , and any provision where it is otherwise expressly indicated that the provision comes into effect on enactment, the Minister, at least 6 weeks prior to the Minister commencing any provision of this Act under subsection (3) , shall— (a) lay before both Houses of the Oireachtas a report outlining the manner in which it has been ensured that each Part, Chapter and section of the Act whic…

I move amendment No. 5 to Seanad amendment No. 2: To delete subsections (3) and (4) and substitute the following: “(3) No part of this Act shall be commenced prior to— (a) the laying before both Houses of the Oireachtas a report by the Minister explaining how compliance with the Aarhus Convention has been assured in the entirety of the Act, and (b) the passing of a resolution by both Houses of the Oireachtas approving the report required by paragraph (a) .”.

I move amendment No. 6 to Seanad amendment No. 2: To delete subsections (3) and (4) and substitute the following: “(3) No part of this Part of this Act shall be commenced until a resolution by both Houses of the Oireachtas is passed in respect of any section, Chapter or Part that the Minister proposes to commence, following a debate in both Houses of at least one hour. (4) A debate required by subsection (3) shall allow for either House to make amendments to any order of commencement proposed by the Minister.”.

I move amendment No. 7 to Seanad amendment No. 2: To delete subsections (3) and (4) and substitute the following: “(3) No part of this Part of this Act shall be commenced until a resolution by both Houses of the Oireachtas is passed in respect of any section, Chapter or Part that the Minister proposes to commence, following a debate in both Houses of at least six hours. (4) A debate required by subsection (3) shall allow for either House to make amendments to any order of commencement proposed by the Minister.”.

I am not sure how this is a point of order.

I will speak about the amendments. When Deputy Matthews was not present earlier, a number of us highlighted the very positive role he played in the stewardship of this Bill on Committee Stage, when I believe we did very good work. I absolutely support him in welcoming the amendment to the definition of "transport". However, there is a difficulty. Amendments in this group refer to section 25, which, as Deputy Matthews knows, allows a Minister to make unilateral changes to planning law through national planning polic…

Hear, hear.