Victor Boyhan (Independent) | Oireachtas source

I welcome the Minister of State to the House. Given that the senior Minister has now gone, having responded to the amendments, I do not expect the Minister of State to change that. It gives me an opportunity to talk about two of the amendments out of this group before us that are very pertinent to the Minister of State as a member of the Green Party. The Minister, Deputy O'Brien, has dealt with them but I will just touch on two. Amendment No. 124 relates to the insertion between lines 16 and 17 of the words, "provisions, plans or existing rural housing”. This provision relates to section 52, "Settlement-specific objectives", which is within Chapter 5 on development plans, which in turn forms part of Part 3 of the Bill, which relates to "Plans, Policies and Related Matters".

The gist of it is about rural housing and we need to acknowledge it. The Minister of State himself has been in here before me to deal with Commencement matters. The Government has consistently promised that there would be regional housing guidelines. These are pertinent now because in a matter of weeks, people will be knocking on doors, including me, supporting candidates for election and they will talk about all the promises they made. One thing we can surely say from the record of both Houses of the Oireachtas, from replies to parliamentary questions and to Commencement matters is that the Government has consistently peddled the story that it is working on the draft guidelines. The Minister of State will be aware, of course, of the Flemish Decree and the responsibilities around that and yet the Government continues to write letters and answer questions that state it is working on rural housing planning guidelines.

The main parties of Government, namely, Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael - not the Green Party - will peddle the story that this is just the Greens and we have to give them a little. There is not an inch of change in terms of rural housing. The Minister of State articulated yesterday his understanding regarding rural housing and that we cannot have, willy-nilly, one-off self-build houses all over the country but I believe in sustainable development. Sustainable development is more than just the environment, it is about sustainable agriculture, sustainable horticulture and sustainable rural communities, which many people in these Houses represent. They will be knocking on the doors within months telling them they did the divil and all. To be clear, I am a Member of the Agricultural Panel of Seanad Éireann and happen to be on the Oireachtas joint committee on housing, planning and local government and the Joint Committee on Agriculture, Food and Marine. I do a reasonably good job of articulating the views of constituents and people who contact my office on these issues.

We need clarity on rural housing. Will we allow people to build rural houses in the communities they belong to? Will we allow our people to live on agricultural and family-owned lands? Will we allow people to build homes in rural communities in order that the schools that many of the people went to themselves can continue. We now have GAA clubs and parish churches in rural Ireland closing down because of the lack of population in certain parts of Ireland. That is a fact. I support building houses in towns and villages, consolidating towns and villages and creating transport nodes and corridors. I go along with all of that but I believe we can do more and I believe we can allow people to live in rural areas.

The Minister of State represents an urban and rural constituency in equal measure so he knows what I am talking about. There are families that cannot afford to have a house. We have people on social housing lists who are members of a family that may own a farm of 100 ha but they cannot get a house. We have people who want to live in these communities in rural Ireland but they cannot get a house. They could possibly get a site from their family if they could build a house. They could get equity and finance to build or partially build a house. Self-build homes can take three, four, five years. The Minister of State will know from seeing self-build houses dotted around Kilkenny. They might not be built in 12 months. They might take four or five years as cash comes their way for people but we are closing up the option. Whatever the Government policy is, that is the Government policy. I am part of the Opposition and I want to highlight the issue. I have been asked to include this amendment in relation to the provisions, plans or existing rural housing.

Clearly, the Minister, Deputy O'Brien, has said he is not accepting the amendment but it does give me an opportunity yet again to articulate a consistent view that I have expressed in this House, that is, we must support families and individuals who wish to build, subject to proper planning applications and processes. There is a stalemate in government where Fine Gael and Fianna Fáil tell me outside these Houses they are frustrated by the Green Party in this regard. I would like to think the Minister of State will be re-elected because he is a man of integrity, commitment and I believe in many of the views he articulates. There is room here for this and while we might not see it in this Bill, what is the commitment on one-off rural housing? Will the people knocking on the doors know? It is not sustainable and it is not in any way acceptable that you can knock on doors five years later and say we are still working on the guidelines. The Minister of State is in government. These parties are in government. They are coming to the end of their term and they need to now show where they stand and be accountable for the promises and the commitments they have made in that regard. I will leave it at that but this is really just an opportunity to again raise that concern.

The other amendment relates to prescribed bodies. Amendment No. 129 proposes, in page 124, between lines 21 and 22, to insert the following,“prescribed body”. The Minister of State will know what the prescribed bodies are. Many members of prescribed bodies are great supporters of the Green Party or in the past have been great supporters. I do not know if that will quite be the case next time but the Minister of State will be familiar with An Taisce and a whole load of bodies. I attached a number of prescribed bodies when I submitted this amendment and prescribed bodies have a main, major and meaningful role. Although a lot of people do not know this, particularly many politicians in here who complain about them, the irony is that many of these prescribed bodies are funded by the Government. If some people had their way around here, they would cut off their sources of funding. These prescribed bodies act in a very important role, such as An Taisce, Irish Water and a whole load of bodies. We have to acknowledge the significant role prescribed bodies have played in putting the brakes on the destruction of our built environment and heritage, which the Minister of State has special responsibility for and a keen interest in. We need to send out all the measures that we believe and support. We will continue to support prescribed bodies as they will be central to this legislation. While many of them have been critical of aspects of the Bill, it ultimately will become law at some point and they will have to work, as we all will, together to get the best of it.

There will be other opportunities at some other stage but I am only giving voice to those two issues. I realise the Minister, Deputy O'Brien, has already made a decision. I accept that and I do not expect the Minister of State to contradict that but I am glad to have the opportunity to articulate those two views.