The Irish Planning Institute has said that the Central Bank is “100% wrong” to say that the planning system is the main reason there is a housing crisis. 

Last week, the Governor of the Central Bank said planning was the “number one” issue holding back efforts to solve the crisis. 

“It’s absolutely planning; this is not a unique situation in Ireland but planning is a problem,” Gabriel Makhlouf told the Irish Times. 

On Newstalk Breakfast, Irish Planning Institute President Gavin Lawlor said planning is only “part of the problem”.  

“I’ve said it before, that planning has become the whipping boy for the housing crisis,” he said. 

“If it was that simple, we would have solved it already, unfortunately. 

“We’ve poured a lot of time, a lot of effort, a lot of thought into how to improve the planning system. 

“And yet we find ourselves in a situation, in fact a worse situation than we were last year.” 

Construction of new road for access to a building site. Picture by: Alamy.com.

Mr Lawlor described Mr Makhlouf’s remarks as “100% wrong” and insisted the situation was “much more complex” than people think. 

“I find it a little bit upsetting that such a high office would make such a basic error,” he said. 

“There’s no way that it’s planning, planning, planning. 

“Every monkey and his uncle hears developers talk about the fact that it’s difficult to fund apartments - they use the word ‘fund’ rather than ‘afford’.” 

Reform

The last Government passed the Planning and Development Act 2024, which aims to “consolidate and revise the law relating to planning and development”. 

However, Mr Lawlor cautioned that planning is “such a diverse industry” which involves a huge number of different people. 

“We have a new planning act that’s going to [need] time… to be implemented by our members,” he said.  

“But it doesn’t mean that we are the problem or that the reason that we’re not building enough houses is because we have plans that are written in the wrong way. 

“The issue is much more complex than that.”

The Central Bank has been contacted for comment.

Main image: A property development. Picture by: Alamy.com