Brian Hayes (Dublin South West, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

Previous governments have taken out of commission all the property-based tax incentives that were in place and that were a contributing factor to the collapse. They are not coming back any time soon. The only advance the Minister, Deputy Noonan, made in this and the previous budgets was on an issue to which Deputy Boyd Barrett referred, namely, improving Victorian houses. That is a very targeted measure very specific to owner-occupiers trying to encourage improvements. The key issue we are making about section 42 is that we have seen some recovery in the market in recent years but we are still coming from a very low base. What is the base? That is a very good question.

If he were here, the Minister, Deputy Noonan, would make the point that we will see how this goes this year. The objective is to move it on for another year. When we introduced this measure, it was as a means of bringing some stability to a market that had collapsed and was in crisis and free-fall. It is the Minister's firm view that the market would benefit from the continuation of this support for at least one more year. Whether it will continue beyond that is an open question which we will have to review in 2014.