An Bord Pleanála probe finds that director of planning Rachel Kenny has no case to answer
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An inquiry into allegations of conflict of interest by a senior staff member at An Bord Pleanála has found the official has no case to answer.
The inquiry also found the allegation was based on “inaccurate media reports”, according to a statement from the board’s chairman, Dave Walsh.
As revealed by The Ditch website, the official, director of planning Rachel Kenny chaired a planning meeting and had other involvement in a planning case in which her husband was part of the applicant team.
Both were present at a meeting on October 19, 2020, to discuss an application for a housing development.
Ms Kenny’s husband, Dan Egan, was representing his company, The Big Space Landscape Architects, which was part of the applicant team.
It was also reported last May that Mr Egan had involvement in two other cases in which Ms Kenny represented the board in her official capacity.
The reports resulted in the chair of An Bord Pleanála Dave Walsh commissioning the HR firm, Resolve Ireland, to investigate the matter.
The existence of this inquiry was not publicly known until it was revealed by the Irish Examiner last Tuesday. Yesterday (Friday) Mr Walsh issued a statement saying the inquiry concluded that “the issues raised had been the subject of materially inaccurate media reports, and that there was no case to answer in respect of breaches of the board’s code of conduct or conflicts of interest in decision-making.”
A spokesman for The Ditch said the website stood over what was published.
“An Bord Pleanála has never responded to our requests for comment on the particular stories to which they refer, nor have they ever raised objections to the veracity of our reports,” he said.
Questions were submitted by the about the terms of reference of the inquiry and details of alleged inaccurate reporting but a spokesperson for An Bord Pleanála said there would be no further comment on the matter.
Separately, it has emerged that the planning board has now conceded 29 judicial review cases so far this year in relation to challenges to board decisions.
The concessions all incur legal costs for An Bord Pleanála and represent admissions, even before High Court hearings get underway, that the board’s decisions were defective in some respect.
The work of the planning appeals authority has been under the spotlight throughout much of 2022, when allegations first emerged of conflicts of interest in relation to the former deputy chair of the board Paul Hyde, who has since stood down from his position.
The Director of Public Prosecutions (DPP) has instigated a criminal prosecution against Mr Hyde.