A total of 24 farming-related planning appeals have been lodged with An Bord Pleanála by environmental campaigner Peter Sweetman over the last 13 months.

Sweetman has warned that he will continue to lodge appeals as long as the local authorities fail to “comply with the law”.

Sixteen of the appeals lodged by Sweetman since 1 September last year related to work on livestock sheds, a further five were dairy units, while two were appeals sought to overturn the granting of planning for slurry storage facilities. The final appeal related to a land-use application in Meath.

Tipperary-based planning consultant Aidan Kelly claimed that essential on-farm development work was being put on hold because An Bord Pleanála has not dealt with the appeals.

Kelly said planning decisions had been delayed by six or seven months and that farmers were “at the end of their tether” with the process as a consequence.

Compliance

However, Sweetman claimed that the failure of local authorities to comply with the law in relation to the Habitats Directive was the primary reason for the appeals.

He pointed out that the European Court of Justice has ruled that any decision to grant planning permission in the vicinity of a designated area must remove all “reasonable scientific doubt as to the effects of the works proposed on the protected site concerned”.

“This is a strict standard and the planning authority does not have legal jurisdiction to give permission if it is not met,” Sweetman insisted.

Proposed developments must also “be assessed for compliance with the requirements of the Water Framework Directive”, he added.

However, the ICMSA claimed the planning process was being too easily manipulated.

“The planning system is impossibly two-faced; it wants farmers investing in better and state-of-the-art facilities and buildings, but then it practically encourages spurious and very often downright mischievous objections. It has to decide whether it wants to help towards solutions or just act as a roadblock,” said ICMSA president Pat McCormack.