An Bord Pleanála still struggling with backlog, with more than 1,000 decisions outstanding
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Planning body An Bord Pleanála continues to struggle with a backlog of cases, with just under 1,100 decisions outstanding for more than four months.
The body has been struggling with the backlog since being subject to a series of controversies in 2022, scandals which led directly to the depletion of its board membership to such an extent planning decisions could no longer be made.
Some 998 normal planning appeals which had passed the statutory objective decision date of 18 weeks post-application had yet to be decided upon as of May of this year, statistics released to Sinn Féin housing spokesperson Eoin Ó Broin show.
Just under 250 of those normal appeals had been outstanding for more than a year, with 21 for more than two years.
Separately, 54 of the cases outstanding for more than a year relate to the now-defunct Strategic Housing Development (SHD) process, which has been phased out for more than two years.
The SHD system was introduced in 2016 to expedite planning for large-scale developments in an attempt to mitigate Ireland’s housing crisis by fast-tracking applications directly to ABP and bypassing local authorities.
However, the system ended up locked in a quagmire of legal appeals and unused planning permissions, leading to its demise from February 2022.
An Bord Pleanála had previously said the backlog it was dealing with would not be effectively dealt with before its staffing issues — both at board level and below — were resolved, with former chair Oonagh Buckley noting the board needed 100 additional staff — for an overall headcount of 300 — by the end of 2023.
As of April 2024, the planning body had 261 employees, including a full complement of 15 board members, though that figure remained 52 shy of its approved headcount of 313.
Responding to the latest backlog figures, a spokesperson said the board “fully acknowledges” the delays which had afflicted its decision-making as a result of the issues ABP had been navigating since 2022, but added “considerable inroads” had been made into the backlog since April of last year.
“The board is working to substantively reduce this further in 2024,” they said.
Previously, it emerged the backlog caused by the scandals at An Bord Pleanála would automatically render planning applications for thousands of homes invalid as they had been lodged under an older system.
The backlog first began to accumulate after questions were raised by the media about the board's decision-making, internal processes, and potential conflicts of interest in April 2022 — issues which eventually saw both former deputy chair Paul Hyde — who subsequently received a criminal conviction — and chair Dave Walsh leave their posts.
Regarding the decision-making times for larger infrastructure projects, the spokesperson said it was “generally accepted” the statutory objective period of 18 weeks “is too short”, adding the board had welcomed the Government’s plans to extend that period to 48 weeks as part of the new Planning Bill currently before the Oireachtas.
Meanwhile, An Bord Pleanála has said a draft report from senior counsel Lorna Lynch into matters related to the various scandals at the planning body — first slated for delivery 16 months ago — is now expected to be received in “the coming weeks”.