Fergus O'Dowd (Louth, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I welcome the clarity in the figures. I also welcome the extremely active and welcome response of the agencies and the Department. I will concentrate on questions. I presume the witnesses are aware of Louth County Council's successful initiative which involves compulsorily purchasing empty homes at an average cost of less than €100,000 per household, including all legal and reconstruction costs. Over 30 homes have been brought back into full family use within a year. Will the Department or the agencies accelerate this extremely helpful programme? I reckon it should be possible to bring at least 2,000 additional social homes into commission within a year.

I am very concerned about the second issue I would like to raise. The CSO seems to disagree profoundly with Fingal County Council on the number of empty homes in the Fingal area. The CSO is very clear on what defines an empty home or an empty property. Fingal County Council disagrees profoundly with that. According to the CSO, there are approximately 36,000 empty homes in Dublin. A gain could be made by bringing 3,000 of them back into commission by means of an empty homes tax or some other approach. Can we clarify whether these properties are vacant? The CSO has suggested that as it surveyed homes in Dublin in 2016, it found that one in every ten homes was vacant. If it transpires that there are families in these homes, it will have been a huge error. Perhaps Fingal County Council has made an error. This goes to the heart of the credibility of the CSO statistics themselves, never mind the Garda breath tests. I know the CSO figures are not wrong by 185,000. What is the real figure?

It could be a big gain for everybody, particularly families on the waiting list.