David McWilliams: L’ultima obiezione di Ranelagh alla MetroLink evidenzia la natura del governo dell’iper-minoranza da parte delle banane

His comments on Canada speeding up their planning process is irrelevant in this case. Metrolink got fully though the planning process but is being held up by a legal process.

Also encouraging members of the public to voice their approval for a project is nice, but doesn’t do much against someone who’s taken a legal case against it

Honestly, given that we have already had referendums to remove archaic nonsense left over from 1937, I don’t see why we cannot at least have a Citizens Assembly to look at the absolute state of our property and planning laws. The whole thing is fucking broken. You have people holding up metros, housing, and basic infrastructure, and not because they are being harmed, but because they can. Our system practically invites objections, appeals, judicial reviews, and every other bureaucratic slowdown imaginable.

It is infuriating watching massive public infrastructure projects get strangled by a handful of people who are concerned about noise, disruption, heritage, property values, or whatever the excuse is that week. The MetroLink project has been delayed for years. The official cost estimates have risen dramatically, going from early projections of around three billion euro to estimates that are now in the region of roughly nine and a half to twelve billion euro, with some warnings that the cost could climb to 25 fucking billion!!! Now we are supposed to sit and wait while the people who already need better public transport, housing, and infrastructure get screwed over because a handful of locals decided to drag the whole thing into court over a metro stop.

Much of this is tied into the Constitution. Article 40.3.2 and Article 43 give strong protections to property rights, and that gives individuals powerful tools to resist developments. That makes every square metre feel like untouchable territory, and changing anything becomes a marathon of reports, hearings, and legal challenges. I’m not saying we should abolish property rights, but we should at least modernise them so that we can have a society that actually functions rather than one frozen in the mindset of the 1930s.

We have had Citizens’ Assemblies before on major social issues such as marriage equality and reproductive rights, and every time there were people predicting disaster. Then the vote happens, and life continues, and the panic fades. There is no reason we cannot use the same process to look at housing and infrastructure. Most of the horror stories would not materialise, and in a few years people would barely remember what they were afraid of.

Instead we are stuck with a system where a tiny minority can derail national level public projects, and the majority pays the price. It is maddening, and it is pathetic. At this point the only responsible action is to bring this planning and property rights mess into a Citizens Assembly, expose it properly, and modernise the whole thing. Leaving it the way it is means more delays, more inflated costs, more pointless court fights, and more national embarrassment. Enough already.

P.S. I am sure some of this comes from government legislation, and I do not pretend to know every detail of the legal side of it, but a lot of the blockage clearly comes from those two constitutional articles. They should at least be reviewed to see what can actually be done, because the situation right now is a fucking joke.