Seán Fleming (Laois, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I will tell my constituent to take the matter up with the Ombudsman if there is no appeals system in place to deal with it. I believe that this is not good public administration. We will test it; that is all I will say. I thank Mr. McCarthy for clarifying that it is decided by the local authority and not by another valuer.

Mr. McCarthy said that the housing assistance payment, HAP, scheme is costing €152 million out of the €1.3 billion budget for social housing this year. I ask him to send us a note detailing the breakdown of the balance, how much is for approved housing bodies and so forth. I ask him to provide information on the make-up of that €1.3 billion budget. I am sure Mr. McCarthy has it in front of him now but I ask him to send it on to the committee.

My next question is about staffless libraries. The Department ran a number of pilot schemes. Was the staffless libraries initiative rolled out in other areas before the pilot schemes were fully assessed and completed? If a local authority wants to refurbish a library or build a new one, is funding only provided on condition that it enables the library to be staffless? The authority may not proceed with the staffless library option, but is it a requirement that the technology be installed to allow for this, with 25% of the funding for the technology to be provided by the local authority? Is that part of the Department's library scheme? Is it requiring that all refurbished or new libraries must be staffless library enabled?