Eoghan Murphy (Dublin Bay South, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I understand the point the Deputy is making.

On Senator Boyhan's questions, I am hoping to have the criteria for the serviced sites fund new week but there are a number of issues I need to get through by the end of the year, for example, the commitments I made in regard to the land development agency, its board, the mica issue, etc. The point I was making in my opening comments was that not having the more detailed criteria with each local authority is not delaying the bringing forward of sites. These criteria become important to the man on the street at the point at which homes begin construction. We need to get the sites agreed and then get construction under way. That brings me to the point regarding local authority assessments on affordability. We have already done a first call to 11 local authorities, which are the authorities we know, without doing too much modelling, have an affordability problem. Nine have responded. As set out in the documentation, Dublin and Cork have been agreed in principle and there are further sites we need to progress. There are some local authorities that will need a proper economic appraisal, to identify vacant homes and the difference between the cost of a home on the second hand market versus the cost of a new build, notwithstanding that we need to increase delivery anyway. They need to make the numbers stack up because, again, this is about the spend of public money. We cannot just sign blank cheques. The local authorities have been asked to do this assessment, the results of which will inform our second call.