Had the news media declined to overdose the public on the tariff pantomime from Washington last week, greater attention would have focused on the revised National Planning Framework (NPF), approved by the cabinet on 9 April.

The title is misleading as there is little sign of revision – the new framework is, in key aspects, a prisoner of the old.

The document selects a target for housing provision of only 50,000 per annum, well below estimates from independent analysts and apparently designed to meet projected population growth without any acknowledgment of the accumulated backlog.

Last year’s completions reached just 30,000 and there is great scepticism in the housing industry that 2025 will see any great improvement.

Some experts believe that backlog elimination alone would require at least an extra 20,000 units per annum, raising the required output to 70,000 per annum or more, and sustained for at least a decade, if affordability of accommodation to buy or to rent is to be addressed.

Moreover, the authors of the revised framework have retained the following feature of the original:

“The purpose of the NPF is to enable all parts of Ireland, whether rural or urban, to successfully accommodate growth and change, by facilitating a shift towards Ireland’s regions and cities other than Dublin, while also recognising Dublin’s ongoing key role.”

To this end they recommend that at least half the projected increase in population should be directed away from the eastern and midlands region, which includes Dublin plus all other Leinster counties bar Wexford, Kilkenny and Carlow, assigned to Munster to form the southern region.

All the rest are called the northern and western region, the five counties of Connacht plus the three Ulster counties in the Republic.

This ?structure gives Ireland a governance system which invites confusion and buckpassing, especially since the critical powers under the planning acts, including the minimal changes adopted last year, remain with the local authorities, of which Ireland is endowed with no less than 31.

The NPF requires recognition of Dublin’s ‘key role’ but provides an additional excuse, if one were needed, to constrain supply where affordability is already impossible for many.

The report of the Housing Commission concluded that population growth would indicate a deficiency in Dublin and Leinster in excess of what was likely to be needed elsewhere.

No local authority, especially the four in the Dublin area, has any practical incentive to encourage residential development.

They will urge more houses and apartments nationally, but ‘not around here’.

That’s a national problem and central government should deal with it, while the local politicians prefer to accommodate the residents’ associations who object to every proposal.

But central government has offered little apart from grants and subsidies which stimulate demand, in the face of an obvious deficiency of supply.

The original version of the NPF has even been relied upon by local authorities to de-zone land previously zoned, and in the high-pressure areas in and around Dublin.

The pattern of population growth across Ireland in recent decades is widely misunderstood.

The perception, beloved of some TDs from rural constituencies, that Dublin has enjoyed a unique population boom which has bypassed the rest of the country is not reflected in the census returns.

There has been substantial population growth almost everywhere – not a single county saw a drop in numbers at the most recent enumeration in 2022.

Consistently strong

Dublin city and county saw population grow around 8% from the previous census in 2016?. The outliers were Meath and Kildare, where population growth, over 13% for both in just six years, has been consistently strong in recent decades.

The reason is urban sprawl, a common pattern in large parts of the United States but less widespread in Europe where governments have encouraged higher urban densities wherever feasible.

The NPF document decries urban sprawl and makes the case for compact development but there appears to be no political will to do anything to bring it about. Dublin remains, notwithstanding the developments which have managed to get through planning, a low-density city by European standards.

The NPF even urges a focus on brownfield sites in urban areas, despite evidence that greenfield sites, and there are plenty in and around Dublin, have sharply lower construction costs.

A good example of greenfield possibilities is the former seminary at Clonliffe, beside Croke Park, where a 1,600 unit scheme has been stuck in planning for five years.

The UK government has lost patience with local authorities and has declared a war on nimbyism.

Local councils which decline to zone sufficient land and to grant the necessary consents will risk losing central government funding. That would merit the title of a ‘revision’ to the NPF.