Darragh O'Brien (Dublin Fingal, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

That is a fair point. There are two things to say about cost rental. We want to scale it up. I welcome the discussion today. One of the measures on the cost-rental viability measure will help to do that and could be transformational. When visiting Delgany with the Cathaoirleach, and many other developments, we meet people who are getting into those homes. It makes a big difference for them and we can do it, without question.

Regarding the cost of construction and how to get costs out of construction, as Deputy Flaherty mentioned earlier, we build much better now than we did in 2008. It is like comparing apples with oranges. The quality of the homes being produced now is more expensive. Fundamentally they are more expensive because of what we are delivering by way of a product. We have to understand that first. I see the measure we brought forward and got agreement on in government today as an activation measure. We are looking at a quick measure to take out a cost that we can actually control. Someone mentioned VAT earlier. If we reduce VAT, we know exactly what amount of levy is being paid on a particular development. We know what the water connection cost is. It is more difficult on a VAT basis to do a rebate. I see that more as an activation measure. I cannot say that all of those levies, the development levy and connection charge, are going to be passed on. I know that they will not but I expect some of them will be. I also expect that this will ensure that developments that would not have started will now start. We can access them through the affordable housing fund.

We are making things more affordable through the first home scheme and, indeed, through cost rental as well. It gives me a large degree of hope when I look at the 25,000 first-time buyers who were able to buy homes last year. There were 25,000 first-time buyers drawdowns last year. Supply increased by 10,000 last year. Social housing was higher on new builds than it has been since 1975. We need to do much more and we know that. We have to respond to the external pressures around the funding environment and the inflationary environment in particular. One thing we can do is, and we are pushing on this, social housing. The LDA will do this also in regard to the use of more modern methods of construction. We have that programme of 1,500 social homes that we have targeted for delivery. This is not always cheaper but it is more efficient and better on the carbon and climate side as well.