Eamon Ryan (Dublin Bay South, Green Party) | Oireachtas source

I do not want to labour that point. I have two others to make. I understand that the Commission cannot influence the decision-making of the European Central Bank. This country's housing crisis is a critical problem, particularly in our cities. If we are to move to change our housing model, we need a model of cost-rental housing that involves using public land in the market to build publicly-owned housing for long-term rental, with the cost of construction being covered by the rental agreement over 20 years. We are being restricted in that regard by the EUROSTAT assessment of whether this constitutes State borrowing, or what the nature of the borrowing is. If we are to solve our housing problem, it is critical that we do not simply rely on increasing the volume of private market housing to be sold, or indeed on going back to the old social housing model. The cost-rental model exists in places like Vienna and Holland, where EUROSTAT historically allowed this kind of borrowing to take place. Now I am informed that it is being stopped or restricted. Does the Commission have any influence in allowing such models of financing public affordable rental housing?