Mr. James Benson:

I would not disagree with the Deputy. We saw in the report last week from the CSO the drop in transactions in a 12-month period when pent-up demand was as high as ever, which shows that there is a lack of availability. One the challenges, as the Deputy correctly identified, is that it noted a 6% or 7% increase for the new, but with the existing home market at approximately 18%, which gave an average of 15%. That is where some of the complications arise. We are competing not only with a replacement costs and affordability challenge, but also with the existing home market.

What I would like to see, and it is not there yet despite a number of reports, is a current costs analysis across all the different delivery models, regardless of who would deliver those homes, that takes into account both recent and future policy and regulation changes. Everyone would agree that what was required five years ago and what we have coming down the line in the next 12 to 24 months are polar opposites. It is welcome and there are better units, but there are significant cost differences in both policy and regulatory influenced costs that are going into the cost of delivery. To get over this debate about who would be best placed to deliver units, it is not just private industry, the State, approved housing bodies or the Land Development Agency, it is a combination of all those across all the different tenure models. We need to have that detailed costs analysis because unless we know exactly what is going into the delivery of all different units across all those delivery models, we will not be able to see where there is potential to streamline some of those costs.

Undoubtedly, there are probably elements of hard costs that can be increased as well. There is a certain amount that is within the builder's control and a certain amount that is outside the builder's control. It is likewise in the soft costs. It is not going to be the case that one element can be reduced and that will be the panacea for housing affordability. It is going to take a combination of fractions of percentages across all those. If we could make some inroads into that, we would have a greater chance of delivering on the targets and on affordable homes as a result of that.