The professional body representing planners in Ireland has claimed that implementing the “very complex” Planning Bill will require extra resources and support to encourage more people to work in the sector.
The Bill, which provoked the ire of Hollywood star Mark Ruffalo and most Opposition TDs, passed in the Dáil by 72 votes to 60 after a contentious final three-hour debate on Wednesday night.
The mammoth piece of legislation, which ran to over 730 pages when initiated in 2021, returned to the Dáil with more than 617 Seanad amendments, with less than 50 considered before the legislation was guillotined.
Minister for Housing Darragh O’Brien described it as the most significant reform in planning laws since 2000. A major plank of the legislation will see An Bord Pleanála significantly restructured, and renamed An Coimisiún Pleanála.
Gavin Lawlor, president of the Irish Planning Institute, said planners were the people "at the coalface" of the new laws.
"We're the people at the coalface trying to deliver the transformative change that the Minister talks about," he told RTÉ's Morning Ireland. "And if there is not enough of us to deal with all of the new ambition in the new Act, then we won't be able to achieve what the Minister is setting out to achieve.”
Mr Lawlor said there had been “significant abuses” of the planning system in the past.
"We have become a nation of Nimbys, unfortunately, and that is as a result of, I think, not engaging properly in the planning system."
He added: "We have probably, if not definitely, the most democratic planning system in the world by far. Anybody in the world can object or raise an observation on any application. In Ireland, all you need is €20 and to make your submission within five weeks of the planning application.
"Democracy is not the issue in Ireland. The issue is having an informed debate with communities, informing them, making them get involved in the process earlier. Because if there's a plan adopted, the plan determines what's going to happen in an area. And if communities don't engage with the plan, it's a little bit too late."
Mr Lawlor said the Minister’s plans for resources were welcomed, but it was of more concern that planners were not on the critical skills list.
"So even though we have quite a number of very well qualified planners in the likes of Australia, New Zealand, Canada, US, just to mention a number of English-speaking nations, we can't get them easily into Ireland to work as planners because they're not on the critical skills list.
"So they have to go through quite an elaborate and delayed process to work here in Ireland. And that's something we've been calling on the Minister for and the Minister for Trade and Enterprise for well over a year now," he said.
"And yet again, this September, when we looked at the new list, and it came out, we weren't on it as a profession. So, you know, if we're serious about resourcing, we need to make every effort possible to ensure that we have enough planners.
"The other thing that we could do is we could ensure that we have more planners going into planning colleges and fund planners in planning colleges more to make it a more attractive career, to make it a more attractive proposition for younger people to get involved in the profession."
