Mr. Padraig McNally:

The issue of Travellers is an age old problem. I was taken aback to read the number of local authorities that did not take up any allocation. My local authority is probably one of those. We do not have a particular problem. Actually, we have a number of halting sites. The new trend is that these Travellers do not want to go into halting sites. Equally, we have a small number of Travellers housed in permanent housing. I have to say, the quality of the housing after a few years leaves a lot to be desired, both inside and out. Committee members can understand why there is concern.

I have people happily living alongside them, but they are constantly reminding the council to educate them with regard to what is expected of them as to how to keep their house if they are going to be in the middle of everyone else. I have to say that other than the appearance of the accommodation in some cases, I do not have very many complaints about them in general in the way they live. They have traditions that we do not necessarily understand fully, but I believe every local authority could do more in respect of Travellers. As an organisation, we would promote a greater uptake in that whole funding area.

Deputy Ryan asked how we would speed up houses with 12 or 18 months delays. I have one solution. I am tirelessly listening to people saying that developers cannot make money, even as of now, by building houses. We should negotiate with them and agree a set fee for them to provide houses to our standards on their land. Many projects are more or less shovel-ready. No matter what we say, and I am speaking against my own to some extent, the private sector can deliver more quickly than the public sector. That is the reality. While councillors want to hold the function of where and when they provide houses if money is given - they are the buffer between the public and the schemes in many cases - private developers can move faster both physically and theoretically.