Mr. John Coleman:

I am encouraged the Deputy sees the rationale, the role and the need for the LDA, although with some concerns.

On the commerciality and the ability to operate countercyclically, if we have the State as a non-market player which is Exchequer-funded in a downturn, the State will be much more constrained in its ability to fund in a way through the Exchequer. One way to think about is if one thinks about the extreme situation back in 2009 and 2010 when there was no money for anything and everything was being cut. If the LDA had been set up then, dependent on the Exchequer, would money have been there for the LDA to buy land and develop housing? My view is that it would not have been.

The Deputy mentioned that we would be dependent on market funding outside the €1.25 billion. That is a significant amount of money which could come into play. If that was capitalised with that equity capital at a point in time when we enter a downturn - we are now nearer the next downturn than we were at the last one - I expect the LDA would be quite well positioned if it were not dependent on Exchequer funding and had its €1.25 billion to acquire land and so forth. That could be countercyclical if it was done during a downturn.

On the accuracy around the €45 billion remark, the Deputy is correct. That was applying a rule of thumb of around €300,000 delivery costs per home. This takes into account that we will be focused significantly in line with the national planning framework on compact development which implies more expensive typologies to deliver such as apartments. These are coming in a bit more than the €216,000 referred by the Deputy.

On the €18 billion versus the €45 billion, the point I was making was the affordability requirement at 40% and the ability to invoke private housing at 60%. This probably increases the amount of market participation that could happen and money from the market as opposed to perhaps money from the State that would have to go towards funding the €18 billion.

A 100% social and affordable housing requirement would become a €45 billion burden on the State in that situation. That is the point I was making around the balance that is achieved with the current affordability level.

On compulsory purchase order, CPO, powers, we are ad idemin respect of the powers we hope to obtain in this regard. That is a work in progress with the Attorney General in terms of working through some of the technical issues around those. The Deputy mentioned that if one does not have extensive broad-reaching powers, they are not worth the paper on which they are written. The Deputy may not have said it that starkly but the point is that we need strong powers. If one looks at examples further afield, for example, in the Netherlands, the existence of CPO powers as a negotiating and bargaining chip, rather than having to use them, is often the most significant impact of them in those situations. I am just drawing the Deputy’s attention to that point. I am in agreement with him on our need for CPO powers, as is the LDA board.

On the point the Deputy made about land values coming across from, say, commercial semi-State bodies, if there was an affordability requirement through Government policy or, for instance, shareholder expectation letters that may be sent through to commercial semi-State bodies, the land values should take account of the affordability requirement which would have the effect of lessening or reducing the land values where there is affordable housing delivered on those sites.