Patrick O'Donovan (Limerick County, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

Absolutely, we do. Private owners of listed properties have an obligation to ensure that they look after them to a given standard. There is an obligation on us to look after them to a standard. We receive properties into our possession on occasion. I mentioned in my speech Annes Grove in County Cork. I was there during lockdown. Its story is one of lockdown, really. It will be open shortly this year. It is one of the newer properties in the sense that it is new to our portfolio. Properties do come into our portfolio from time to time, but perhaps not as often as I would like. Then again, we are not a bank. We do not have deep pockets. They are certainly not as deep as I would like to have. However, where the attention of the State is drawn to particular properties, the chairman and the commissioners always evaluate them and make a decision in the best interest of the State. When they make such a decision, they do so having weighed up the asking price and costs in the best interest of the State. They routinely acquire property for the State. It is the commissioners who make the decision, in consultation with the Department of Public Expenditure and Reform, but having regard to the need to achieve the best value for the State. Adding value and assets to the State's property portfolio is the right thing to do, but only at the right cost. As I stated, we are not blank-cheque merchants and we add to the portfolio only where it is the right thing to do.