Thomas Gould (Cork North Central, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

I know I am going off on a bit of a tangent, but a road in my constituency that was resurfaced recently is also down for traffic calming measures. There were two separate budgets. A road on a housing estate was resurfaced, with speed ramps to be installed there 12 months later. I refer to the carbon footprint that is being caused by the initial resurfacing and doing jobs twice. All Departments and local authorities must be responsible and not waste resources on double-jobbing, with the consequent impact that has on the environment and our carbon footprint.

That came to mind when Deputy Ó Broin referred to the fact that there are between 70,000 and 98,000 vacant properties in the State. The Government missed an opportunity to tackle this problem when it dealt with vacancy recently. There are vacant buildings all over my constituency. Mr. Meally referred to this earlier. Local authorities should go in to retrofit those properties and turn them around so that they can be used for housing, or funding should be provided to housing agencies so they can do so. We are talking about our carbon footprint and carbon budgets but there are between 70,000 and 98,000 vacant properties. The census carried out last Sunday will provide a lot of good data. We know this is an issue in every village, town and city in every constituency. Mr. Meally referred to vacant properties and shops and what have you. We have been talking about it for ten years. Cork City Council was talking about it 15 years ago. Here we are now. There are people talking about problems with insurance, deeds and fire safety certificates.

Mr. Meally stated that in some ways Ireland is leading the way and that we are leaders in terms of some of the work we are doing here. In the context of the report published yesterday on global warming and where we are in the context of climate change, if Ireland is leading the way, the world is in big trouble. That is putting it politely. From where I am sitting, Ireland is not leading the way. We might have a couple of good ideas and projects but on the greater scale of things and in the context of delivery, we have a housing crisis and a climate crisis. If we sort out derelict buildings and vacant properties, that will help to solve the housing crisis. It is a win for everyone. I have been raising this for two years here with the Minister and the Department. I raised it for 13 years before that as a councillor. In 2009, I made my maiden speech on Cork City Council on the issue of the housing crisis and I was laughed at. We are now in 2022, 13 years later, and the crisis is much worse. Mr. Meally referred to vacant properties. I do not believe enough is being done. I attend the meetings here and I do work on the ground. I do not see enough being done in respect of vacancy, trying to retrofit vacant properties and providing funding for local authorities to issue compulsory purchase orders, CPOs, for these properties and then retrofit them. The Government recently published a Bill. To me, that Bill was not alone a missed opportunity; it was a disaster for both the climate and housing.