Pearse Doherty (Donegal, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

I move amendment No. 16:

In page 20, between lines 6 and 7, to insert the following:"13.The Minister shall, within one month of the passing of this Act, prepare and lay before Dáil Éireann a report on how he will monitor on an ongoing basis the effectiveness and the value for money of the Help to Buy scheme.".

Amendment No. 16 deals with the help-to-buy scheme. I would have expected that the Minister would have seen sense over the summer period and would have ended the help-to-buy scheme. Unfortunately, that is not the case. Instead, despite the fact that the scheme is costing in the region of €40 million per year, the Minister has extended its use. It is a supply-side problem and this scheme does nothing to deal with the supply-side pressures. Before I go into any further detail on this, I ask the Minister to outline why he believes it is appropriate to continue with the help-to-buy scheme given that there is no evidence to suggest that it is meeting the intended rationale proposed by the Minister on its introduction that it was an effort to help individuals to gather the deposits required to meet the Central Bank and that it would lead to increased supply.

This amendment calls for the Minister, within one month of the passing of this Act, to provide a report on how he will monitor on an ongoing basis the effectiveness and the value for money of the help-to-buy scheme. It is my party's view that the help-to-scheme should not continue. We have opposed it from day one. It was a scheme that should never have been introduced. It was done on the insistence of the Minister but with the support, through its policy of abstentionism, of Fianna Fáil. It has literally put money into the pockets of developers and has led in no small way to the increase that we see, year-on-year, in house prices.