Joan Burton (Dublin West, Labour) | Oireachtas source

There is an additional point I want to raise. At the moment in Dublin and in Ireland generally, land speculation is back where it was about 20 years ago. What is the advice of our visitors? Ireland has always failed to dampen speculation on building land. In terms of an affordable three-bedroom house anywhere in the Dublin region at the moment, the land cost per unit has probably now gone past €60,000. In more desirable areas, I reckon it is up around €100,000 per plot. That is why in many areas, including in my own constituency, we are seeing well finished A-rated houses but they are not terribly big. The cheapest of them is about €450,000 but a lot of them are €550,000 to €600,000. I think a lot of Deputies will have the same experience. The crisis for many people is that this is what is supposed to be affordable, never mind the issue in respect of social housing. Do the witnesses have any thoughts on how we could limit or prevent the spectre of this massive return to land speculation?

On the climate change documentation, the thing I was most disappointed about was that there has to be a fairly exact quid pro quo to anyone whom Mr. Murphy was mentioning earlier as being on a lower income threshold, in terms of fuel poverty, such that the carbon tax would be offset by a corresponding increase, certainly for people-----