Joan Burton (Dublin West, Labour) | Oireachtas source

The Minister has to face the facts. The housing market is beginning to expand and a significant number of houses are being built, particularly in my constituency, but it is not enough.

They are nowhere near the numbers required. That applies to councils which are building, organisations which are building houses for rent and the private sector.

Notwithstanding all of the money being pumped in which ought to be sufficient to address the crisis, there is a failure of market regulation. I would be the first to acknowledge that regulating the building market is intensely difficult. It means dealing with very diverse individuals and much of the market is still only recovering from the crash, particularly for smaller and medium-sized builders. We are talking about the perfect storm. The industry is not even bothering to train apprentices. In three years we will be crying out to have people brought here from other countries to build the houses we will still need. The actions taken are not near adequate. In that context, the proposed amendment is extremely modest. It would provide for ongoing reporting on effectiveness and value for money achieved and the manner in which they will be monitored. The Minister for Finance has a key power when it comes to oversight and monitoring. I draw his attention to one element of the market that is causing huge problems in Dublin. Because of the extraordinary increase in the price of housing land, for those involved in the provision of finance capital through companies on the Stock Exchange, bank investment or other investment vehicles, it is highly profitable to sit on land and do nothing. That is not acceptable. We know that there are delays in providing road and bridge access and so on. However, there are also people who are consciously sitting on land and because of this the pace of development is being slowed down. The value of so many portfolios is being elevated by the surge in land values and house prices. The Minister really does have to act. I support the amendment-----