Victor Boyhan (Independent) | Oireachtas source

I will be brief as I am conscious of the time. I have a few comments to make and two questions to ask. I thank the panel for coming in. All of us in this room know that we have a housing crisis. I was very interested in the comments of Dr. Healy, Dr. O'Toole and Dr. McQuinn. They all referred, in a very interesting and pointed way, to the delivery of social housing. That was very interesting because it is not something we always hear, yet here we have general consensus and agreement on it. I will not go as far as to say they were critical, but in some ways their remarks were very pointed. It will be interesting to look back over and read the transcript of this meeting because I believe the witnesses were spot on. I welcome their comments. The reality, as we all know, is that we need to be building or rolling out approximately 30,000 houses. Someone said that earlier on. Nothing less will make any real or significant difference. The reality, as we know, is that there is a crisis in social housing, affordable housing and in both private and public housing. There is very little public housing. The situation is improving but there is very little. It is simply not good enough. We are not building enough public, social and affordable housing.

Where does all that fit into our deliberations today? We are of course focusing on the impact of Brexit on the housing market so I want to keep my comments to that issue. It is important that we acknowledge that Brexit will have a very significant impact on our economy. It will affect jobs, budgetary constraints and employment. It is going to affect an awful lot of things. From what I have seen in both papers, I would suggest, and Dr. Healy possibly suggested this in his paper, that while this demand will be felt in many ways, there will also be opportunities. There are potentially many opportunities for Dublin and the east coast, but Brexit will also impact on Dublin, where the housing crisis is greatest in terms of the delivery and building of social and affordable housing, the purchase of private housing, and every other aspect of people's accommodation and housing. We already have major demand and now we will have this impact.

Dr. Healy suggests in his paper that, all things being equal, Brexit will possibly boost foreign direct investment into the Republic and, with that, inflows of personnel which will generate greater demand for housing, including rented accommodation. I welcome any opportunity that Brexit brings because in every crisis there is an opportunity. I welcome the opportunities on which we can capitalise in terms of inward investment and inward migration. That has to be positive. We have to be ready and prepared to seize that opportunity. The crisis will be in accommodating these people and providing them with homes and housing. That is the real challenge.

I want to ask two questions. Dr. O'Toole talked about the construction industry. He mentioned that and picked up on it in previous comments. Has either organisation done an in-depth analysis in respect of the construction industry and the impacts on it in terms of bringing in product and labour and all the issues associated with that? The two questions I want to ask specifically, and which I ask the two organisations to address specifically, are as follows. What challenges will the construction industry face following Brexit according to their projections and analysis of the situation? What potential effects, if any, will Brexit have on the movement of construction materials between Ireland and the UK and, for that matter, the rest of the European Union?