Mattie McGrath condemns rushed wind, planning and judicial changes

Yes, I chose to raise a pint with this situation we find ourselves in this evening and I don't know, maybe you'll explain to us last Thursday when we were dealing with this bill, to the Minister of State Deputy Collins was here and I don't think he's in any role, or maybe he has, didn't get to check his portfolio but I thought it was education and so we should all be in education because I think the government needs to learn a lot from this behaviour. Have you not even listened to the Oorten Eireann when he criticised last Christmas, after Christmas, the amount of legislation that he had to deal with sent to him? I think we have 12 pieces of legislation going, will be delivered out in the coming weeks and I know that this is a whole new bill. Raheel has been shocked when the Minister so glibly and quite arrogantly told us that he'd be introducing five new sets of amendments, I think for six when it came and 69 different amendments, you come in and tell us they're mostly technical. A lot of these things aren't taking it at all and it's, it's, it's, it's ham-fisted, it's rushed and it's very, very serious legislation. Now, I mean you made a plea then to us on this side of the house regarding the short term lettings and how urgent that is. Did you only find this out in the last couple of weeks that there was a problem with short term lettings? I mean, I don't know, it makes us believe who's, who's, what's driving you, who you're working for or whatever. And also, as I said, the legislation then, so long ago we dealt with the Maritime Bill that was disclosed here. And then he gave a plethora of amendments again to tell us that we don't take them now and we don't deal with them, we mightn't get them, reach our 30 targets. He said, now you've found that out. So we're telling you that with the ages that were, until the first time we reached our 20 targets that we've set, that we must keep our lights on by some form or other to keep them working and keep them on and keep some kind of energy. Because it's going to be slow and it's going to be, it's going to be very, very difficult and challenging. But we can't just sign a blank check here for wind developers or whoever else offshore and out of sea, which I'm not against. But I certainly think that we need time to scrutinise, because there's ecology and there's whatever, wildlife in the sea, that must be predicted as well. So I think it's very sharp practice and it's very, very, very, very poor. And then in the middle of it all, and in conjunction with this, an inquiry going on into Bord Panala. So what's Joe Public going to think about this? You know, many of them that felt, you know, didn't get a fair hearing. There are many, many that I'm dealing with, not to mind to say, in my constituency that have had, you know, issues with planning, went to repeal. The inspectors in Bord Panala came down and did their job as they're applied to do as inspectors and gave a report. And there's over, the reports 90% of the time were rejected by a few members of the board we know now, we didn't know before. I had no idea inside that only three members may be looking at it and judicating it. So what's the plan paying the inspectors if this is going to go on? So this inquiry, first of all, there was nothing and then there was more and there was nothing. And then we saw resignation last week, Friday night, I think, of a pretty senior person. So confidence in the planning system is at an all time low. Our county in Tipperary just finished the county development plan. After a lot of work, and I want to thank the planners. Indeed, the councillors finished it last Monday. And a lot of work. And for that debate in and settle, and we'll have to live with that for the next five years. This last one, I think it was seven years because of COVID and everything else, and delayed and everything else. But the only process, the only way we found out about Port Panora was because of judicial reviews. And now I think you're going to try and curtail them as well. And, you know, this legislation is as a result of a Supreme Court case, or some of it is certainly to deal with that. But it's kind of dealt in such a way, telling those 11 gentlemen across the river with the wigs and gowns, that don't mess with us, we can change the rules to make you comply, or to make you more compliant. So, I'm very, very disappointed. I'm very disappointed, because I know you, and I knew you before every year in government, to be reasonable and to be flexible. But I'm thinking you're spending too much time with the senior minister, how could I forget his name? Gareth O'Brien, or the new Rambo's, I call them, from Dublin North, because the arrogance is oozing out of him. And it wouldn't mind if it was doing anything meaningful, like the building houses that we need for the people, but to try and come in and tell us that we're shameful and we're not right and we're not responsible, we're not accepting these, accepting these, I mean, okay, you've withdrawn, I think you said 25, you would withdraw in relation to judicial review, but you wouldn't withdraw anything if you hadn't challenged. And to be critical of the media, legislation has to be, it's a duty in us to interrogate, to examine, and to try and amend or point out the flaws, but we can't do that with no time. When I questioned this last week, I was told by the minister flippantly that you'd have a brief on next Monday. That was last Monday. But some of us have a witness in the constituency, we just can't drop of a hat, because you're forced in to give a briefing on a Monday here. And then, as Deputy White-Batter said, the only explanatory random that arrived this morning, at two minutes to nine. And can I also say, in fairness to the bin's officers and the drafters, they've worked all night some nights recently. It's totally unfair on those good people, and they do great work. It's totally unfair to feist all this legislation, not only this billboard, with four or five of them today, feist it all on top of them, and they're expecting to work all night through to deal with it. And so the best people in the world would make mistakes in that kind of situation, because of tripios and everything else, because of lack of sleep and time. You could teach some of the dictators, the regimes they have, how to sleep deprivation and everything else. But look, it's a mess, as far as I'm concerned. It's like filling the mixer, when you're mixing the concrete, you've tried everything into the mixer here, and hoping that it'll come out in a good mix. But it won't. It'll come out in a dodgy mixer, like liquids of all sorts, and we won't have anything decent as a result. And no impact analysis in any of the legislation. Now, this legislation, especially, to see how it's bedding in, no review clause, no nothing. So it's a wide-west kind of legislation, as I said. Going from the board of Penola, from short-term lids, to the maritime bills of well-regarding wind. And making it empowering, giving more power to the planning, the office of the planning regulator. How do we manage in Ireland, in our country, ever before we had the office of the planning regulator? I remember being in the county council back in the 90s, and being there again in the 2000s, and making our county development plans. And we had to be looking over our shoulder, and we had to be browbeaten by the office of the planning regulator, and be told at every step that, look, the office of the planning regulator won't accept this. So, are we taking away every last vestige of power that elected members of the county council have, where they had the making of the plan? And now you have, first of all, you had to fight for management. You could never get independent legal advice. It wasn't available to you. You had to take the same legal advice that the manager got, which was totally unfair and discriminatory, unless you wanted to pay for it yourself. That was prohibitive. You couldn't do it. And now we have the office of the planning regulator as well. So it seems to me you have all these offices now, and all these offices, and these offices with brass plates on the walls, and fancy furniture, and nice jobs for the boys. And I did last week, and I say it again, and I think they're pretty much as you sit here, he was critiquing me for criticising the NGOs, and criticising on Tashka. I'd make my criticism without fear or favour, because what they did in relation to the Lanbea plant, the cheese plant in Kilkenny, was nothing short of national sabotage. National sabotage. They had no issues, and I'll probably be repetitive now, and it's a shame I'm allowing me, they had no issue with the plant, with the emission licence, with the planning, with anything else. Their issue was with the health number. And why they could, how they could be allowed to have a situation that they could object to this, and go to the courts with it, several times, I think three or four times, and threatened to go to the European court, I think as well. And the fairness of the teacher, I don't give him much praise, but he did say one day to me here, that this system of judicial reviews will have to be looked at, because it was a head of, and thank God the sod was turned on it two weeks ago, and it's convinced. We're so lucky that the Dutch investors stayed with us, stayed the course, because this wouldn't happen many places, and, and, and now it's been built, and, and meanwhile, we were lowering in, in big laden trucks, full of milk, up to Stratawai, and all over the country. No talk about the cabin footprint of that. So, the narrow-mindedness, and the whole pettiness of Antashka, and when we had a meeting, Deputy Illy Ray here, and myself, and our colleagues, we could not only disdain. Now, I never was against Antashka, because they did great work, and, in tidy village, and heritage, and with the green flag schemes, and many others, and I'm not dismissing that they should stay at that, but I do, I, I do, I do question their role, in the likes of that, and many other areas. They are do-gooders, well-paid, well-heeled, and not, many of them retired, have seen their, um, good positions, and good pensions, and the trouble they're putting householders through, and people want to build their own homes through, is not in charge of disgraceful. Now, I'm not reckless, we don't have good planning, but I must take, I must take up Deputy, um, and he might, I know he's a good colleague, Deputy, you know, Kenny was down walking, my mountains, I call them, knock me down mountains, two weeks ago, and you're all welcome, but he might come sometime, I don't know how you'd move a mountain, um, um, Deputy, I haven't been on Delhi, I haven't been on Delhi, the mountain, there was a slippage, a landslide, that's not moving a mountain, you don't move mountains. I said it fell down. No, he said the mountain fell down, yeah, I mean, a small bit of a slip, a small bit of a slip, look, anyway, I'm just saying that, we get carried away in our language too, come and see the mountains, like mountains, yeah, I mean, I mean, the mountain fell, the mountain fell, the mountain fell down, but thank God, it didn't fall on top of anyway, anyway, so, there'd be more calamities, but, I do know now, that that's the subject of a court case as well, but, Minister, I think this is, just, just totally anathema, to good governance, to good legislation, and it's, it's, it's, it's, it's makes of pure, like, pure just disrespect for opposition, and for everybody else, and, like, it'll be wide open for legal challenges, and, while I'm not in favour of, I'm in favour of, the houses being built, and everything else, but, I'm not in favour of the big, big, the big, condomers building, numerous houses, and they can get, ease of access to planning, and they can, kind of adjust it as they go along, that's not, good legislation either, so, we need to, when we think of the small, the small people, they want to build their house, and I have, at least 20 of in my county, young couples, that have the way of it all, have a site, and can't get planning, to build a house, in the middle of a housing crisis, so, I mean, there's a lot of things, could have been addressed in this bill, and they're not, so look, I'll leave it at for the moment, but I am hugely disappointed, and very disappointed, that this is the way it can, and you might give an explanation to me, if you can, as to why it was, Minister Collins, nothing against him, but he was here last week, he's in the education department, dealing with this, piece of legislation, that only added insult to injury, and the bad. That is Mr Mackler. Madam President,