Bernard Durkan (Kildare North, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I was thinking, fortunately not out loud, that it was aimed at me when my hair went grey - the colour it is now - when there was mention of the pensions time bomb, which we were always talking about and which was coming down the track in 2038. Nobody has ever conceded there has been a huge influx of people into this country in the intervening period, most of whom - nearly all - have been in the younger age group. There is a theory that a diminishing minority will have to fund all the people who will be retiring and so on, but that equation does not stand up at all. I have not seen it put to the test yet.

In respect of what we were talking about earlier, the most important thing is not to scare people in terms of taxation in general. We did all those things in the past and tried things out that did not work. For instance, I heard a discussion the other day about zoning tax and in theory it is a good idea but people will tell you it should be at a higher level. Well that depends on what the purpose of the exercise is. If it is to get more money out of it to spend in various other areas, obviously what is going to happen is the people who go into the houses are going to have to fork out for that at some stage. On the other hand, if the purpose of the exercise is to encourage people who have zoned land to get rid of it, by getting houses built and so on and so forth, that is a different thing. There are two totally different purposes envisaged there. One is to encourage the owner of the asset in that case to make it work and move it on. The other is to wreak havoc and drag a large amount of money out of it every year without doing any good for the end in sight, which is to build houses.

The point I want to make is, if we had solved everything in this country at the present time, which unfortunately we have not done, the issue of housing would still remain to be dealt with. As a Deputy, I have never seen more pressure on young families and young couples who cannot afford the deposit, let alone anything else. They will tell you it is impossible now to buy a house. You find out about the various assistance schemes available, which is a waste of time because all the various supports are counterproductive. They run against each other. They raise prices, demand and do all kinds of things. To go back to the pipe dream, a family needs a minimum of €100,000 and it depends on how many people are working in the family as to where the €100,000 is coming from. Nobody comes home with 100% of their salary. It does not happen that way. Generally 50% is gone. When all the talk and the discussion comes about, nobody ever says that to get €100,000, you need nearly €200,000. Now we are into really dangerous territory and we are heading back into the inflated prices we see at present. It is sad, really.

I am aware we have had the Covid-19 pandemic and 100,000 things recent years that have impeded progress in housing. The problem has been we have never agreed on how to deal with it. Everybody has had the answer but it has had to be their way. Some people thought that local authorities should hire plumbers, plasterers and roofers and so on. It does not work that way anymore. There are people who specialise.

Nobody would go to a consultant surgeon who is part-time and only does an odd job now and again. We would not try that out. It does not work that way. We go to specialists. These are people who have done all the economics on how to do the job, so this is what we must do in this regard as well. Various things can still be done, however, to correct this situation, if we hold our nerve. There is a little bit of light at the end of the tunnel.