Tommy Broughan (Dublin Bay North, Independent) | Oireachtas source

Mr. Lucey talks about entrepreneurial spirit and enterprise. Has he ever heard of an Italian economist who teaches in London named Dr. Mariana Mazzucato? She wrote a famous book called The Entrepreneurial State. She showed how almost all the major entrepreneurial decisions in the development of the IT industry and electronics generally, including all the elements of the web, were made by the state and university sectors rather than private industry. In fact, private enterprises like Facebook and Google ran with systems that had been put in place by the state. I do not see where this is coming from. I worked briefly in the construction industry when I was a kid. The Ahern and McCreevy Government decimated the construction ability of city and county councils. It ran down the workforce and got rid of apprentices and skilled tradesmen. That is what happened. We did not have the kind of State involvement in housing that had accompanied the private sector in the past. I worked for contractors on both public and private estates.

Why is Mr. Lucey moaning about Dublin and the number of cranes on its skyline? Should he not rejoice in that? Most powerful economies tend to have a major capital city. Some 40 million out of 125 million Japanese live in the greater Tokyo area. Some 20 million Argentines live in Buenos Aires, out of 48 million in total. Half the Austrian population lives in the state of Vienna, though there are historical reasons for that. What is the big deal with this? Should we not rejoice in the fact that when one goes to the top of this building and looks towards the south east, about eight or ten high-rise buildings are rising up over the fabric of the city and all those cranes are out there? The same is happening in my own constituency of Dublin Bay North. We face some changes in Limerick. Limerick city and county will have one leader. The newly enlarged Cork city has upwards of 200,000 people. There is also Galway as well as Belfast and Derry in the neighbouring jurisdiction. Why moan about this? Why not just decide to expand on that and build houses, particularly in the Dublin region? A lot of the high-rise buildings are commercial, such as the 24-storey building by the Liffey and other neighbouring buildings.

Mr. Lucey spoke about confidence and "normal times". When were there normal times? All times have problems and issues. The country is undertaking the national development plan, the national broadband plan and retrofitting. The Construction Industry Federation told us that 50,000 houses would come on stream in 2023 and 2024. None of us on this side of the room believes that supply and demand are in equilibrium. That is fantasy. It is not the case. There is no question of that being the case because in my constituency between 7,000 and 8,000 families are on a housing list. There are 20,000 such families in Dublin city alone and we believe the true figure for the whole country is almost 130,000. There is no equilibrium. We are miles from equilibrium because nothing was done for seven or eight years. What more confidence does the industry need? Even with Brexit we will have a lot of construction if there is a moderately soft landing, which there probably will be under the new Prime Minister. Should we not be planning on that basis rather than worrying about confidence? What is confidence? Confidence was there in the late 1990s and early 2000s. The problem is that the State abrogated its role in doing something about this after 2008 and 2009.

I agree with Mr. Lucey about the shared equity loan scheme. That would be a useful development. On the point of apprenticeships I note that we have given SOLAS the responsibility. Even before the crash, as a Deputy I found that it was very hard to get sponsors after the introduction of the new system of seven segments. Some five of those were awarded in college and a further two on the site. One could still find young boys and girls getting four or five sections and struggling to get an employer who would take them over the line. The Brits have elevated apprenticeships to degree level. Things have changed in construction since I was assisting plasterers. There are many big sites in our constituency, and I note the role that crane drivers are playing. Walls and practically whole apartments arrive in blocks. The technology is changing. Construction is a high-tech industry. These qualifications should be recognised as level 8 qualifications, the level of a basic degree. Last week we gave the institutes of technology the power to award any degree they like up to doctoral level.