Paul McAuliffe (Dublin North West, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

One of the fundamental tenets of a cost-rental system is that the original costs of constructing the units over the lifetime of the project are used to calculate the rent, including maintenance, sinking fund for repairs and so on. I do not agree with this idea of identifying the rent in advance of the LDA knowing the cost of constructing it. Deputy Boyd Barrett is not actually making the point about the cost-rental model; he is making the point that there should be public construction and that, instead of using a builder to construct that, we should be using the State to construct. There are many different arguments around housing but the idea that the State would establish its own building company is very far from much of the debate. I ask Mr. O’Rourke and Mr. Coleman to come back and clarify that that is the model and that we are not suggesting we would roll out a new social housing model for those people on higher incomes. We are trying to establish a cost-rental model that could then become the predominant model for renting in the market. We are replacing the private rental market, or if not replacing it, we are competing with the private rental market and we are not seeking to roll out an expanded version of social housing.