The REPORT OF THE TRIBUNAL OF INQUIRY INTO CERTAIN PLANNING MATTERS & PAYMENTS has finally been published. In many respects given the extensive coverage of the work of the Tribunal some might suggest that there was nothing in it we all did not already know. In part this is true but nonetheless the many recommendations of the Report, particularly regarding the organisation of planning policy in Ireland requires more detailed consideration than perhaps what has been limited to a few commentators in the national media. Ignoring the recommendations would do a grave injustice to the work of the Tribunal. More worryingly if decisions are taken to put the Report onto that infamous shelf which is full of planning reports, the potential to once and for all address many of the inadequacies of the planning process in Ireland will be lost and that would be inexcusable.
The Tribunal has applied a common sense approach to the planning process. It clearly recognises the need for a system based upon the democratic process within which it places the local elected members as a critical hub in the overall proper planning of local communities. In doing so it does, however, recognise the continuing need to integrate the planning process across local and central government and the absolute necessity of applying regional and national planning frameworks. In doing so its thinking complements best international practice which seeks to integrate spatial planning within the broader strategic direction of the national and regional planning process. It highlights the need for a more democratic foundation at regional level in Ireland, suggesting a move towards regional elected government rather than the nominated structures currently in place.
Equally significant the Tribunal Report calls for external overview of planning in Ireland. Many other countries operate independent planning inspectorates which will examine the policies adopted at local level to ensure that such policies complement the national framework. This has long been highlighted by those in the planning profession in Ireland as a serious gap. Such inspectorates are, of course, not unusual in other policy areas in Ireland with, for example, the Garda Siochana having to operate within an independent inspection regime under the Garda Inspectorate/Ombudsman or many of the commercial state agencies operating to guidelines and overview from various Commissions. Given the current limited understanding on the role of such bodies and the hysteria associated with the number of quangos in Ireland it is difficult to see whether such a recommendation will actually come to fruition.
A key and welcome recommendation is that the overall planning of the State needs to be put onto a statutory footing. Doing so would provide a more structured form of guidance to the local and regional planning authorities and might make it more difficult for local one off decision-making which has been at the heart of some of the difficulties identified in the Report. Of course such statutory provision would itself not fully mitigate the circumstances in which conflicting decisions can arise at either local or national level. Statutory provision must necessarily be underpinned by having in place the necessary consultation platforms on which policy can be developed across the layers of government. This is normal practice in most advanced and successful economies, something which is entirely lacking in the Irish system of public management.
The Tribunal also recognises a significant weakness within existing statutory provisions dealing with spatial planning. The role of the Minister has seen changes to a considerable degree with the new powers conferred on the relevant Minister under the Planning and Development Act, 2010. While entirely understandable given the need to create more integration across the policy layers, the Report does nonetheless highlight the potential for a single national politician to influence either in a positive manner or more worryingly in a negative way, the proper planning and sustainable development of the country and particular areas at local level. One of the critical aspects to any policy area is the need to have transparent systems in place which underpin the decision-making associated with that policy context. Indeed this was one of the main reasons a Tribunal was needed in the first instance. Unless such powers are underpinned by such transparency and by clearly integrating the local policy process with the national process, the Tribunal seems to be indicating that the potential for senior politicians to use the planning process negatively might actually have been reinforced through the 2010 legislation. This is something which the Programme for Government also seems to acknowledge so it will be interesting to see how this is addressed in what should be critical reforms to planning under the current Programme.
A further welcome recommendation is that where county and city managers and their staffs are required to approve planning applications through, for example, Section 140 of the Local Government Act, 2001 those so promoting would be required to account for their direction. Currently, if something is within the law a manager is obliged, notwithstanding professional perspective, to approve such requests with little or no consequence. Extending the obligation to account for such directions, along with presumably the risk consequence of such direction, would bring much greater coherence to local planning. It might also be, quite frankly, something which many local elected representatives would welcome, given their general concern to properly account for local policy in the chamber.
For this is something that must be highlighted. Notwithstanding the depth of the investigation, the numbers of local representatives highlighted as acting inappropriately is relatively limited to a particular cabal which found its role models in national political leaders. The vast majority of elected representatives do not seem to have engaged in such inappropriate behaviour. The criticism, highlighted in the Report, and a valid one it might be added, is that with apologies to Edmund Burke, “the silence of the just men”. All the more important, therefore, to have in place proper whistleblower legislation and an independent inspectorate to overview not just the planning process in local government but also the process at national level.
A further key recommendation, again something which the current government seemed to acknowledge with the adoption of the Programme for Government, is the need to address the profits generated by way of planning designation. Maybe one of those dusty reports might be about to get dusted down after all? The Kenny Report has been ignored since its publication in 1974. While it may be a case of the horse having bolted, the Tribunal Report acknowledges that the introduction of an 80% windfall tax on profits/gains attributable to land rezoning by the National Asset Management Agency Act 2009 is a significant move to reducing the attraction to make corrupt payments in order to influence land zonings should the opportunity to make such profits return in a hopefully more sustainable economy.
An over-riding recognition in the Report is that establishing a system which prevents new systemic weaknesses from arising in the future is central to preventing the reoccurrence of corruption in the planning system. It does reject the notion that local elected members should be removed from the planning process, particularly the making of polices addressing the development of local sustainable communities.
This is important as it recognises not just the significance of having local elected representatives making such decisions but it also recognises that active participation in local electoral politics is fundamental to transparent government and its absence is one of the features of systems which are corrupt. Greater engagement in the policy process is what is required, not less, but such engagement must bring with it the accountability of being a policy maker. All to long the system in Ireland has allowed for policy engagement without responsibility, or at least responsibility which could easily be put onto the shoulders of others. Transparency is a fundamental feature of any form of policy development and taking it out of the public arena would, as the Tribunal acknowledges, be a retrograde step which might only stimulate the conditions on which unaccountable governance might flourish.
The publication of the Report rightly brings with it much soul-searching on the part of those charged with political responsibility at both local and national level. Its many recommendations provide a template on which a revitalised planning process might be established along with a renewed local political process. The challenge for all those with an interest in the proper planning and development of our local communities is to use the opportunities provided by the publication of the Report to drive reform in the planning process. It would be a great pity that in four decades time we find ourselves referring to the Report in the same way Kenny is referred to. Hollowed regard with nothing to show for it except the bad planning decisions which blight our daily lives.
