Planners in the local authorities are seeking an urgent meeting with the Minister for the Environment, Mr Dempsey, to complain about the allocation of some senior planning posts. The posts have gone to officials with no professional qualifications.
The attempt to secure ministerial intervention follows an emergency meeting of planners at the weekend to express their growing concern about the direction of reforms being made under the "Better Local Government" programme.
Mr Stephen Dowds, secretary of the Irish Planning Institute, said the planners were angry that the system's integrity was being tarnished at a time when confidence needed to be strengthened.
Noting that it was the planners who had recommended against the many land rezoning decisions now being inquired into by the Flood tribunal, he said they expected Better Local Government to produce a properly staffed and resourced planning system.
Instead, the system was being "seriously undermined by the effective downgrading of professional planners in many local authorities", with some senior positions - previously known as city or county planning officers - being allocated to officials with no planning qualifications.
The issue first arose in South Dublin County Council last year, when it was decided not to fill the post of county planning officer; instead, management replaced the job with a "director of planning services".
Mr Dowds said planners saw such moves as "little else than a dismantling of their career structure". The process was "further undermining the already poor morale among planners", he said, adding that many senior and experienced planners were leaving local authorities for the private sector because their career structures and status were being downgraded.
In the planning institute's view, the delivery of a more efficient and better staffed planning service was not just a matter of numbers. "Career structures and status are equally important to ensure the attraction and retention of the most capable and experienced professional planners."
Unless the Minister intervened to ensure the reform programme was properly instituted, Mr Dowds warned there would be "serious adverse consequences for the ability of local authority planning services to meet the demands now being placed upon them".
