Attorney General Rossa Fanning has told senior Ministers there will be a “robust defence” of a legal challenge to the Coalition’s new design standards for apartments.
A judicial review taken against the standards will begin on Monday, taken by four county councillors and journalist and author Frank McDonald.
The new guidelines being challenged, published in July, increased the number of studio apartments that could be built in developments, as well as other changes the Coalition has argued will close a “viability gap” that has stymied apartment building.
However, critics have said the changes are a developer-led race to the bottom.
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Last July, several Dublin city councillors raised concerns at the potential ramifications, saying the city was at risk of becoming a “cultural wasteland” full of “small, dark” homes.
The issue of judicial reviews was among the main items on the agenda of the Cabinet subcommittee on housing which met on Thursday. The Attorney General was invited to discuss the legal challenge specifically, and told senior Ministers there would be a “robust defence of the State’s case”, according to people familiar with the meeting. Mr Fanning was encouraged to defend the case as strongly as possible.
Both Taoiseach Micheál Martin and Tánaiste Simon Harris are said to have told the meeting that the legal development was “very serious” amid warnings it could “paralyse” apartment supply.
Legal experts and property developers have indicated there will be a chilling effect on the use of the new guidelines while the case is continuing.
Coalition sources from both Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael said it was their strong belief the standards were lawful and that a “strong message” should be sent to the industry on that point.
Alongside Mr McDonald, the High Court challenge is being taken by Labour’s Darragh Moriarty, the Green Party’s David Healy and Dan Boyle, and Independent councillor Pádraig McEvoy. Mr McDonald is a former environment editor of The Irish Times.
When the new guidelines were published in July, Minister for Housing James Browne said they would be key to addressing the “urgent need to increase housing supply”. Arguing they would bring Ireland in line with European norms, he said they would result, in some cases, in an average of €50,000 to €100,000 cost reduction per unit and “will get apartment building moving”.
The guidelines removed restrictions on the mix of apartment types within a scheme. They also reduced the minimum size of a studio apartment to 32sq m while introducing a new standard for a three-bedroom apartment of 76sq m. The guidelines permit fewer windows and lifts, and less private open space.
They also reduced the percentage of apartments in a development which had to be “dual aspect” – with opening windows on two external walls – from 33 per cent to 25 per cent.
