How’s this for blatant daylight robbery from the Planning Authority? On the one hand you have to pay €2,096 per 50 square metres of your business establishment office as a ‘contribution’ to the commuted parking scheme, which supposedly go to provide/organise better the parking facilities in the area of the same business.

Your business permit will not be issued unless this (and other fees) are paid. This unjust fee was introduced way back under a Nationalist administration. Don’t imagine for one minute that because one paid a few thousand euros then parking spaces were guaranteed!

On the other hand, now, under a Labour administration, not only is this fee still payable but, to add insult to injury, parking spaces are being taken away at a very fast rate to be given to catering establishments so they can place their tables and chairs on the road. Are these establishments being asked to pay €2,096 per parking space they are taking up?

I had asked the PA how much money had been collected from this scheme since it was introduced back in 1993 and how has/is this money been/being utilised for the purpose it was collected for. Any audit trail? Dead silence from both administrations.

The truth is this money is not being used for the right purpose. Furthermore, parking spaces are being taken up to satisfy the few.

Could the money have been lost? Possibly.

I leave readers to judge.