Ombudsman to focus on planning breaches

The Ombudsman, Ms Emily O'Reilly, said today she intends to increase her focus on infringements in planning law in the future.

Ms O'Reilly, who took up the post last year, was speaking at the publication of her office's annual report for 2003.

The Ombudsman received 2,213 valid complaints last year, compared with 2,526 in 2002. Some 45.3 per cent related to civil service departments and offices, 33.4 per cent concerned local authorities, 16.4 per cent were about health boards and 4.4 per cent of complainants had problems with An Post.

Ms O'Reilly noted that 27 per cent of all the 1,080 complaints her office received about local authorities related to planning matters. Most of these were from individuals who had complained to their local authorities about people or businesses building without permission, but found nothing was done about it.

She said there was a "yawning gap" between the issuing of enforcement notices and compliance with these notices, pointing out a number of recent exposés of major breaches in planning law as evidence.

Ms O'Reilly argued that although there can't be one law for big developers and another for private individuals, there remains seeming reluctance of local authorities to enforce planning laws and developers are becoming more brazen in their flouting of the rules.

Under the Planning and Development Act 2000, which was implemented in 2002, local authorities were granted increased powers of enforcement and "going after people" who broke the law. "Our role is to see that they use these powers," she said.

She compared planning permission to penalty points, noting that motorists are slowly reverting to old habits, after an initial period of slowing down, because they know that there is insufficient Garda enforcement.

Ms O'Reilly said the comparatively low number of complaints about health boards and hospitals were down to two reasons: the fear of complaining and the fact that most of Dublin's public hospitals do not fall under her remit. She said she was looking forward to changes in legislation this year which will bring them under her scope of inquiry.

"There isn't a history or culture of complaining in hospitals," she said, as people didn't want to be seen to be making a fuss. "I was surprised to found out how few complaints we actually heard." However, said there has been "substantial progress" in her office's relationship with health boards.

"We are a nation that only acts when we are forced to act," she said, citing the smoking ban, penalty points, the plastic bag levy and the increased use of clampers in Irish cities. "People say we've become a nanny state, but maybe we need a nanny."