Conor D McGuinness: Demands Certainty on Gaeltacht Housing

I'll put this question in English, but it's about the role that your department will play in amending and finalising the recently published draft National Planning Statement for Rural and Gaelic Housing. And I know this has been discussed several times here this evening and you and I have discussed it as well. But this is a document that relates to the core. I would say to the core mission of your department. So I want to know exactly what role your department will play in those aspects. Just thank you for your ongoing work on this. It's not on the back of the envelope stuff, your inputs and Deputy Associate's inputs are always considered. As you know, the primary responsibility lies with the Minister for Housing, Local Government and Heritage. The draft statement is, in my view, one that strengthens the planning system support for the Irish Lamage in Gaeilteacht areas, makes it clearer and more consistent by setting out the Lamage criteria, which may be submitted with applications for new single rural dwellings and requiring a proportion of multi-unit developments to be lived in by Irish speakers. Importantly, the policy also recommends that the Gaeilteacht community spare a specific culture, Lamage and identity. It introduces the idea of inter-Gaeilteacht recognition, meaning Irish speakers who live and work in one Gaeilteacht can use that experience and time to show they may meet local need requirements in another Gaeilteacht. One of the key benefits of the introduction of a new policy approach applied consistently across the country, providing more certainty for people wishing to build a new house in a rural area and the avoidance of prescriptive local policies that see different standards applied between neighbouring counties and indeed sometimes within a county. Currently, there is no consistent method for local planning authorities when developers are reserving a percentage of the housing development for Irish speakers. This method of using the percentage of speakers outside the education system plus 10% as proposed will be based on the current linguistic composition of the area rather than setting a uniform national figure across all Gaeilteacht areas. This is about certainty. Certainty to people who wish to remain living in or wish to return to their rural communities. Certainty to planners and supporting a vibrant, sustainable rural Ireland. There will be discussions with interested parties in the coming weeks. In the context, a meeting is scheduled between my officials and Conrad na Gaeilge later in the month. I look forward to engaging with you and Deputy O'Snoddy in this space. We will engage very directly with Minister Brown and Minister Cummins in relation to this during the course of the coming months. Thank you. Minister, when the document was published last week, I think we were all taken aback. Certainly commentators, opposition politicians, campaign groups, people working in the space, both in terms of the rural housing piece and the Gaeilteacht housing piece. To be absolutely honest, not only was it underwhelming, deeply disappointing, of course, the Gaeilteacht, but it looked like something that had been utterly rushed and that was put together very quickly without a whole lot of thought and certainly taking very little from the consultation, the submissions, the recommendations of various Oireachtas committees and discussions here in this house. I feel it was a rushed job by the Department of Housing. You may disagree or may not be at liberty to agree with me publicly, but one that didn't take into account the good work and the fair policies that your department has been promulgating over the last while. In terms of the rural housing piece, as part of our analysis, we have spoken with analysts, we have spoken with engineers, architects, planners, merchants, builders, auctioneers, and they don't see that this will dramatically increase the delivery of housing. They don't think that this will lead to a liberalisation of policy. They just don't see that happening. I think that leaves many communities in the lurch and facing the demographic crises that have been mentioned in this house already this evening. Thank you. Minister. Deputy, in the context of the Gaeilteacht, the draft statement of Gaeilteacht, I do reject your analysis. We work very closely with the Department of Housing on it to try and get a balance. The important thing, Deputy, is to get a balance in Gaeilteacht areas between those with Irish and use Irish as a daily language and the new people to move into it, but also those with Gaeilteacht areas that do not have Irish. They equally have a right to stay in their place. We need to get a balance. Secondly, I was anxious that we got a balance in relation to not encouraging further holiday home development. I want permanent residences for families to grow, to live and to work and live through Irish and then drive the demand for Irish schools, Irish education, Irish cultural facilities, etc. But, as I said, I'm happy to work with you and Deputy Snoddy in particular and colleagues across the Gaeilteacht side of it to address some of your feedback. We won't incorporate it at all. There is an environmental screening process currently underway and I'll share that information with you as to what's involved with that after this session. Thank you, Dara. In terms of Gaeilteacht, you don't feel that there is a need or a need for the local communities to work in this area in relation to this issue. It's clear that there is a demand and there is a need for money in relation to the environment. I suppose, and I would like to hear from you on this, that you use statistics from 2016 in your report to address this issue, as you say, in relation to Gaelic speakers. In fact, the statistics are clear and I'd like to hear from you on that. I don't think that they have anything to do with you as an individual or as an individual in relation to the whole thing. There is a lot going on and I had meetings with the local communities in the past. There are people who are very, very concerned about this issue. We can't say that this is an issue for a few months now and then. There are people who are concerned about this. And the thing that comes out of this is that it's not fair to people from those communities who want to speak Gaeilteacht and speak Gaelic and bring their families to speak Gaelic. And it's not fair that that's the case. So I'd like to hear from Páibhlaí to do the same thing, but to do it in a way that is fair to the people who want to do it, because it's not fair to listen to each other and to listen to the people. Thank you. Thank you, Dr. O'Neill. I wrote the figures. The figures that we're looking at, the new statistics that we're looking at, but I wrote how difficult that is. You know, I'm, as I said, as I said earlier that we lost the doctor, right, I'm sorry that feedback, when we work together, we work together as if it's something that comes out of that togetherness. And I'm happy to work with you. And as I said, there are opportunities for us, and those opportunities put a lot of work into the opportunities that you have. They're for people like Conrad, who were here this afternoon, and they were able to do this week, but Conrad wasn't able to do it. And I'm happy, as I said, to be able to sit down with someone from any week or any day of the week, and talk to them about whether they want to work on this. And it's not just writing in a book, but whether they want to work on this. And I'm happy to do that. And to work with the Brown Foundation as well. We'll be doing work on the question, with the seven months and the question, maybe, and work after that work with the Brown Foundation. So, like, as I said, I'm looking forward to your work. Thank you, everyone. See you this morning. Okay, we're moving on to question number nine.