Mr. Barry Quinlan:

There have been some important immediate milestones, not least the publication of the Bill. Significant work has been done by Mr. Nicholson and his team, working with the serviced sites fund. Many of those schemes are now much closer to being able to start to deliver. It is actually very timely. We recently met the CCMA, whom we meet all the time, regarding the publication of the Bill in particular. The feedback we are getting is that, as was mentioned throughout the discussion today, affordable housing is in significant demand across council chambers, particularly in the greater Dublin area and other cities where housing affordability is an important issue. My sense is that local authorities are absolutely committed to delivering and being the key delivery partner and facilitator of affordable housing. We are now working through that with them, building on the pipeline that is there in the serviced sites fund. We are working on that with reference to what could be delivered over several years. Much of that is being factored in to the work we are doing on the Minister's detailed housing for all plan, which will, as I stated, come on stream in the summer, while, in parallel, looking at the funding streams. It is obvious that local authorities have a very important role.

We will also work closely with AHBs on the new cost-rental scheme. There is significant commitment across the AHB sector to deliver affordable housing.

We regularly meet the LDA. It is and will be increasingly important for it to understand in detail the various schemes and the role of local authorities as housing authorities and planning authorities, as well as how it can contribute in terms of, for example, the 400,000 homes that are available from its immediate land bank. As the Deputy stated, it will also be increasingly important for the LDA to be able to aggregate land, including public land, and develop into the future in that regard. As we now have the tools in the toolkit, as the Deputy put it, and given the funding that is and will be available, we will be working through those detailed plans with local authorities, AHBs and the LDA.