Bernard Durkan (Kildare North, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

Absolutely. Nobody refers to it on that side of the House. It is one of the things we have had to live with. During the period of doubt about the IBRC and other institutions, I was the recipient of countless phone calls from small savers on a daily basis who were inquiring about what they should do with their few shillings. They said they had been saving for a few years and asked if they would have to take their money out of the banks and hide it in boxes under their beds. Several people did that. The reason was they were afraid the banking system was going to implode, that bondholders would be burned and that they would have nothing to offer their families or even enough money to bury themselves. It was a sad state of affairs. I hope we averted that particular problem.

Another area that is taboo now is energy. We tend to avoid the difficult issues. I predict that if the country does not address over the next four or five years the energy problem and our energy requirements, as with water, we will find ourselves beset by carbon penalties that will cripple us. It will not be the European Union, but the international community that will impose those penalties on us. Whether we like it or not, if we fail to put the machinery in place to increase dramatically the alternative energy available to us, a high price will be paid. It will be paid, inter alia, by the farming community as it will not be possible to complete Food Harvest 2020. Certainly, in the aftermath of the abolition of milk quotas, the expansion of the dairy and beef industries cannot take place and will be hit by huge penalties and fines across the board. We can do all these things, however, if we plan in time and adopt the necessary measures.

Another aspect of vital infrastructure is housing. Housing is a vital part of the economy and it is in an awful state currently.

There is a simple reason for that. There was no forward planning. For 15 years there was no particular planning for local authority housing. There were no targets. It was handed over to the private sector and voluntary housing agencies. These agencies are excellent in dealing with special needs housing, sheltered housing and other particular areas of housing. However, for the general thrust of local authority housing, there is only one answer: build enough houses through the local authorities and ensure the local authorities are to the fore in meeting that market. That has the effect of balancing the value and the cost of housing generally throughout the economy. It means there is competition, provided by the public sector, in the marketplace. There is no harm in having a little competition between the public and the private sectors. If we have that competition, we will have houses that are good, valuable, safe and reliable. These houses will last a lifetime and will be available to people on the housing lists.

Deputy Stanley mentioned that there are almost 8,000 people on the local authority housing list in my constituency of Kildare. More than 7,000 people are on that housing list and there are housing emergencies every day. Kildare was one of the places that experienced a boom during the building boom. Houses were being built to beat the band on a daily basis. I have hope for the plans put in place by the good people in this House.

How many more minutes do I have? I want to leave five minutes for my colleague.

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