The Minister for Housing, Planning & Local Government had previously made an order commencing the timeframe provisions set out in the new emergency legislation. The order took effect from 29th March and remains in place until 20th April, a period of 23 days. See our previous post: http://www.mckevittking.ie/blog/post.php?s=2020-03-31-planning-permission-suspension-of-statutory-timeframes

 On 16th April 2020, prior to the expiry of the original Order under Section 251A, a new Order was made by the Government, to extend the period of the original Order, having regard to the concurrent period of restriction on non-essential activity and necessary provision for a number of additional days to be added to this period to allow for appropriate notice of revised arrangements, on expiry of the extended Order. In the context of the current civil emergency arising from the Covid-19 pandemic, the Government has decided to extend the Order that originally commenced on Sunday 29th March 2020, until Saturday 9th May 2020 inclusive, a total period of six weeks (42 days).

In other words, the normal timeframe allowed for processing planning applications has been extended by 6 weeks in total. The pause button has been pressed!

For further information please see the following Department of the Environment FAQ document: FAQs revision 2