Seanad Report/Jimmy Walsh: There were angry exchanges during a debate on the Draft Guidelines on Rural Housing, with several Fine Gael speakers accusing the Government of trying to manipulate public opinion in advance of the June elections and Government members claiming that Fine Gael was against rural housing.
Mr James Bannon, FG Environment spokesman, clashed with the Chair on several occasions and at one stage the Cathaoirleach, Mr Kiely, adjourned the sitting for a brief period. The early contributions by speakers were punctuated by noisy heckling across the chamber.
Mr Bannon was ordered to withdraw comments he made about Mr Ian Lumley, Heritage Officer of An Taisce. He noted that Mr Lumley, "whom one assumes to be impartial" had attended the Fianna Fáil Ardfheis last week-end. "Was he there as a member of the party faithful or is there more to his attendance than meets the eye?
"This is a man who has accused the people of rural Ireland, who are trying to build homes for themselves of - and I quote - 'massive fraud' in their planning applications. Mr Lumley is not worthy of his position and should be removed without further delay".
Mr Kiely demanded that Mr Bannon withdraw that remark, which he eventually did.
Mr Terry Leyden (FF), said it was very unfair to name an individual in the way that Mr Bannon had done. Mr Lumley had attended as an observer on behalf of An Taisce, not as a member of Fianna Fáil.
The Minister for the Environment and Local Government said that because of the importance of the rural housing issue, and the fact that there had already been an extensive opportunity for debate, he had urged planning authorities and An Bord Pleanála to take the guidelines on board straight away.
They would be put into effect both in development plans and in the processing of planning applications. He believed that the guidelines had the capacity to, and would, deliver a new era of fairness and transparency in planning for rural dwellers.
Dr Mary Henry (Ind) said they owed Fintan O'Toole a debt for having published an article about the problems encountered by the former Chairwoman of the Irish Blood Transfusion Service over her inability to obtain the expertise which she had sought.
"Unfortunately, we had an excellent Chairperson of a board in dire trouble receiving board members which she felt couldn't do the job".