Competition for rates revenues fuels bad planning: An Taisce

"All of them (the councils) compete against each other for rates reveue and for capital contributions which is the money that comes in after granting planning permission," said an An Taisce spokesman who asked to only be known as James.

"So unfortunately (local councils) are quite biased in favour of development…They gave the go-ahead to developments that weren't needed in the hope that they might take place and might bring in extra revenue."

He said An Taisce was therefore "calling for a wholesale reform of the (planning) system".

In its report, An Taisce slammed the planning decisions of city and county councils across the country.

An Taisce looked at various factors to rate the country's 34 councils - including overzoning, the amount of vacant houses and water quality, among others.

Donegal has the worst planning record in the country, the report claims.

The county was one of nine – Roscommon, Leitrim, Kerry, Mayo, Galway County, Cavan, Carlow and Waterford – warned they have failed the test for good decisions on housing and development.

An Taisce’s report said Donegal had about 2,250 hectares of residential land in 2010, enough for a population increase of 180,000 but half of all planning permissions over the past decade were granted on unzoned land.

Charles Stanley-Smith, An Taisce spokesman, said the legacy of bad planning will affect people living in the areas, and Irish society, for many generations.

“Bad planning is not victim free. The analysis shows that there is a very strong correlation between councils that have scored poorly and a range of negative socio-economic and environmental outcomes,” he said.

An Taisce checked the record of 34 city and county councils using several factors including the percentage of planning decisions appealed to An Bord Pleanala reversed, vacant housing stock, one-off housing and land rezoned.

The association called for an independent planning regulator, free from political pressure.

The report, State of the Nation: Ireland’s Planning System 2000-2011, gave four councils a C – South Dublin, Dun Laoghaire-Rathdown, Galway City and Fingal while 13 got a D grade and eight received an E grade.

Five received an F grade, Mayo, Galway County, Cavan, Carlow, and Waterford County, while four councils received an F minus grade including Donegal, Roscommon, Leitrim, and Kerry.

An Taisce said that the problems experienced in Donegal were symptomatic of the wider issues also identified in Roscommon Leitrim and Kerry.

No council achieved an A or B grade.

Here is how An Taisce ranked the councils from highest to lowest, with scores based on the organisation's own points system using eight criteria, with a maximum of 272 points:

:: Grade C – South Dublin, 200 points, 74%; Dun Laoghaire Rathdown, 199, 73%; Galway City, 190, 70%; Fingal, 185, 68%.

:: Grade D – Meath, 167 points, 61%; Wicklow, 167, 61%; Kildare, 163, 60%; Cork City, 157, 58%; Dublin City, 153, 56%; Limerick County, 152, 56%; Offaly, 150, 55%; Limerick City, 144, 53%; South Tipperary, 139, 51%; Westmeath, 134, 49%; Laois, 131, 48%; Louth, 123, 45%; North Tipperary, 122, 45%.

:: Grade E – Waterford City, 120 points, 44%; Cork County, 118, 43%; Kilkenny, 115, 42%; Longford, 106, 39%; Sligo, 102, 38%; Clare, 100, 37%; Monaghan, 94, 35%; Wexford, 94p, 35%.

:: Grade F – Waterford County, 88, 32%; Carlow, 85, 31%; Cavan, 83, 31%; Galway County, 83, 31%; Mayo, 82, 30%.

:: Grade F minus – Kerry, 70, 26%; Leitrim, 60, 22%; Roscommon, 44, 16%; Donegal, 32, 12%.

An Taisce called on Environment Minister Phil Hogan to restart the independent inquiries into planning matters in seven councils which were suspended in favour of an internal review branded “scarcely credible” by the organisation.

The report warned about the link between bad planning and higher rates of residential vacancy including ghost estates, population decline and emigration, lower house prices and significant water pollution.

Mr Stanley-Smith said the Celtic Tiger property bubble was as much to do with poor planning policy as reckless lending.

“If there wasn’t lax planning where would the people have got planning permission to seek the loans from which they went out in billions looking for,” he said.

“Lax planning has caused as much of a problem in this country as lax financial regulation. If there hadn’t been lax planning there could not have been a property bubble,” he said.

Mr Stanley Smith said that based on the population figures, the lands rezoned and the permissions granted, the authorities in Donegal might as well not be planning at all.

Among other recommendations the report called for a radical overhaul of local government in Ireland beginning with a cull of councils – down from the 88 city and county authorities and the 54 town or borough councils to about 25 local authorities catering for 200,000 people.

An Taisce said it would support a site value tax, similar to the scheme in Denmark, to ultimately replace the €100 household charge.

The association also claimed it had been marginalised during the Celtic Tiger years but highlighted that it made submissions on about 3% out of 450,000 planning applications lodged during the decade.

Some 80% of the appeals it made were upheld by An Bord Pleanala.