Gabhaim buíochas leis an Aire. In the spirit of Christmas, I too have no particular issue with what is being proposed here. Broadly speaking, I support anything, within reason, that helps somebody to turn a vacant commercial property into a permanent home. I also support measures that would make it easier for people to increase the provision of animal housing and exemptions for stand-alone slurry storage, within reason. I caution this by saying we have had a number of issues in Limerick in recent times in relation to Georgian buildings, the owners of which have benefited from the exempted development guidelines. In some cases, they have been fantastic. In other cases, they have been less than fantastic. We have had issues whereby people have bastardised buildings in Limerick without facing anything really in the realm of consequences from the local authority. We really need to resource our planning departments around enforcement. Otherwise, we will end up with more poor quality housing, which is definitely not what we need. We need to conserve our architectural heritage because we have lost many shopfronts and features in our Georgian cores, particularly in Limerick, due to people having benefited from this and having not done what they were supposed to do with the building. Regarding the exemptions for animal housing and stand-alone slurry storage, I have a number of environmental concerns. Anything we do must remain strictly consistent with Ireland's obligations under EU and national environmental law, including the habitats, birds, water framework and nature restoration directives. Flexibility is important but it must also not undermine our environmental obligations. We need to make sure that what we are doing here is sustainable and that it does not increase intensification, and that slurry storage is subject to strict citing and separation standards. I am glad that an SEA and appropriate assessment of the proposal for the amended exemptions was conducted because I do not, as other speakers have outlined, think it was appropriate to have tried to do this without having done that. We cannot afford to address our housing and infrastructure needs at the expense of public safety, environmental resilience or compliance with EU and national law. This brings me on to a brief point before I conclude about the upcoming exempted development guidelines for residential development. I have a slight concern there about the potential unintended consequences of the proposed changes around, essentially, substandard sheds being rented out on the private rental market without appropriate inspections and protections. I know that is not the intention but I am worried that this could become the unintended consequence without a proper regulatory framework to protect tenants and to protect the quality of our housing stock. While the intention of this measure might not be to grow the private rental market, many of these units will invariably end up rented out without proper planning and a safety framework with tenant protections. I would like that noted. Broadly, however, I have no issue with these measures.

Sentiment score: 0.18