The new Land Aggregation Schame (LAG) is a costly, bureaucratic and senseless scheme
Issued : Saturday 20 November, 2010
Local authorities obviously have a real problem meeting interest on loans used to buy land. To date central government has met this cost for 7 years after purchase. Usually lands would be developed in that time. Now, due to the economic meltdown of our country, lands are not being developed and councils cannot pay the interest which accrues on these loans after the expiry of the Government guarantee period.
Government should solve this problem by simply extending their payment period. Instead they have set up a new expensive quango, the “Housing and Sustainable Communities (HSC) Ltd.” to take possession the lands but the state will be still have to pay the interest!
If Councils are to avoid being left with hefty interest bills, they must apply to this quango to ask it to take possession of all Council lands where interest is about to fall due. The HSC can pick and choose which lands to accept, leaving councils with the interest bill on those it rejects. The HSC can then use these lands for other public projects or in theory it may allow the councils to use the lands at a future time. However, no one knows how this might happen as no procedure has been drawn up for transferring back the lands.
In practical terms, if for example Cork County Council bought land to build a by-pass or a water treatment plant, , and they are forced to transfer it to HSC, that land may be used for some other project by the time the Council gets departmental permission to proceed. And then the Council will be accused of disposing of vital land needed for public infrastructure.
Cork County Council is being forced to hand over its vital land banks to a new quango which will cost more to administer when all the government had to do was to extend its quarantee. More bureaucracy, more administration costs and once more a savage attack on the autonomy of local government.
It makes no sense.
Cllr 
