Ms Caroline Spillane:

We feel that affordability should be an explicit objective for a body like the LDA. NESC, in its submission to the committee, talked about this notion of engineering affordability into the supply of housing. Having a supply of housing does not necessarily equate to the housing being affordable. One of the key measures that could be considered, which the committee has heard before, is the whole notion of cost rental, where affordability is considered to be permanent because the rents cover the costs and the equity that accrues as the loans are repaid creates this notion of a revolving fund that is then plugged into ensuring that further land is available, and that the amenities and services to the land remain of high quality.