Mr. Bob Jordan:

Regarding vacancy, we are trying to tie together a number of things. I mentioned earlier the Housing Agency acquisitions fund has been acquiring vacant properties for social housing. We now have an advisory role on compulsory purchase orders. We will have a technical team working with approved housing bodies and local authorities under the Town Centre First programme. I will give an example of some of the things that are happening out there. The Peter McVerry Trust converted a bank branch in Cork city centre into a regional office and also apartments, including two apartments for people coming out of homelessness, including Housing First. One of the roles we can play is to act as a clearing house for some of the atypical vacant properties, including bank branches, post offices, pubs, Garda stations and so on.

It is really important that the first home shared equity scheme gets up and running by mid-year. There are a number of complex aspects to it, including a special purpose vehicle. Obviously, criteria need to be in place relating to price caps and so on. There is a target this year to deliver 1,750. Therefore, it is ready important for that scheme to get up and running on time. Our team have been working hard on that.