asked the Minister for the Environment the number of appeals received by An Bord Pleanála in each local planning authority for the years 1977, 1978 and 1979, the number of oral hearings held by the board during that period, for each category and for each year, and whether the board upheld or reversed the original decision of the planning authority in each case.

Figures giving a breakdown of appeals received by An Bord Pleanála are not maintained by reference to individual planning authority areas. I can, however, give the Deputy a breakdown of appeals received in respect of each county and county borough. The figures for urban districts and boroughs—excluding the four county boroughs and Dún Laoghaire—are aggregated with those for the appropriate counties.

Details of the numbers of oral hearings held by An Bord Pleanála in respect of individual areas are not available but I will supply overall figures for 1977, 1978 and 1979. Similarly information about the effect of appeal decisions is not available on an area basis but overall figures are supplied.

As the information is in the form of a tabular statement I propose, with the permission of the Ceann Comhairle, to circulate it with the Official Report.

Following is the statement:

Breakdown of Appeals by area—1977

Breakdown of Appeals by area—1978

Breakdown of Appeals by area—1979

Oral hearings held by An Bord Pleanála

The following table shows the effect of appeal decisions by the board in 1977, 1978 and 1979.

I appreciate that the Minister of State is circulating the tabular statement and I thank him for that but his preliminary answer concerns me. The appeals come from individual planning authorities. Do I understand the Minister to say that in the tabular statement he is circulating there will not be a breakdown by each county area or each local planning authority area?

There will be a breakdown of all the counties where ap-peals have been lodged by the applicant in the county where the appeal is made.

And the length of time?

I will deal with that in replying to another question.

8.

asked the Minister for the Environment the number of appeals currently lodged with An Bord Pleanála which have been awaiting a decision for (a) two months, (b) four months, (c) six months and (d) eight months or over.

An Board Pleanála indicate that information in the specific form requested is not available. However, an analysis of appeals on hands on 31 March 1980, by reference to date of receipt is as follows:

To obtain a proper understanding of the above figures it should be noted that there are various procedures and other factors outside the control of An Bord Pleanála which have a major impact on the time taken to deal with appeals. Some of these factors were outlined in the board's annual report for 1977 and include delays in submitting grounds of appeal, requests that appeals be held in abeyance, awaiting documents from planning authorities, circulation of documents to the various parties to an appeal, new issues arising in appeals and in some cases inadequate plans submitted with the original planning application.

In the first two years of their operation An Bord Pleanála made very good progress and were reducing progressively the float of appeals on hands. The postal dispute in 1979 was a severe set-back causing the number of appeals on hands to increase and the time taken to deal with many appeals to be extended. An Bord Pleanála have informed me that they are making every effort to speed up the processing of appeals and to reduce the numbers on hands.

Can the Minister of State indicate, either in aggregate form or for the four categories of time into which he has broken down my question, if he has information in relation to the delay as to whether the appeals in question are awaiting further information from (1) the local authority, (2) the appellants or (3) any third party appeal?

It is across the board, actually. It is the applicant; it is also the planning authority and there may also be a request in connection with an oral hearing.

Will the Minister undertake to issue a circular to all local authorities to try to speed up their response to requests for additional information from An Bord Pleanála? When an appeal is lodged the local authority are frequently asked to supply additional information or to submit their reasons as to why permission was or was not granted and in some instances this can cause delay as the appeal cannot be dealt with until that information comes in.

I have received no complaints from applicants in this regard but if it is desired that a county council or a local authority should be informed I have no objection to that.

9.

asked the Minister for the Environment the reason he has not appointed (a) a woman member, and (b) an architect to An Bord Pleanála.

The statutory provisions governing membership of An Bord Pleanála do not require the appointment of a woman member or members to represent any group or profession. The terms of office of four members of the board expired on 31 December 1979. Full consideration was given at that time to the type and qualifications of people who should be appointed to the board. Having carefully considered the matter I decided to reappoint two of the existing members and to appoint two new members.

Have the Government and the Taoiseach and the Ministers involved considered that from the vast range of people eligible and indeed interested in this board the Fianna Fáil Party were unable to find a single woman who was qualified in the view of the Minister to sit on the board and, secondly, were unable to find an architect who qualified as suitable?

The terms of reference of the board do not specify that an architect should be on the board or that a woman should be on the board. I am not against a woman on the board and I shall bring the Deputy's remarks to the notice of the Minister.

Will the Minister bring the remarks to the notice of the Commission on the Status of Women and to the notice of the Taoiseach who gave certain assurances to the same commission in relation to full representation of women on State boards?

I shall certainly bring the matter to the attention of the Minister and it is then a matter for him.