Anne Rabbitte (Fianna Fail)

I raise the issue of voids in Cork and Galway in the last ten years. Cork County Council and Cork City Council have received €50 million in the last ten years to bring voids back into use. Galway County Council and Galway City Council received €12 million. In fairness to Cork City Council and Cork County Council, between them, they have brought back 3,100 voids into operation, while more than 820 were brought back in Galway. I applaud Cork city and county councils for the work they are doing. I also applaud the Department's transparency. It is good that I could get these sorts of answers today. A total of 25,000 voids in the last ten years have come back into operation.

A local authority can grant planning permission to a developer to build 100 homes, 200 homes or whatever they have been granted, but the local authority can add stipulations that the developer must create the public realm. That seems unfavourable, particularly when it comes to a city development. Asking a developer to put in a public realm as part of the terms of conditions to granting them planning permission is not a fair way of doing business. I would like to hear the Minister's opinions in that regard. We want our developers to be building the houses for us in Galway city.

Another issue I want to raise relates to affordable homes. One of the biggest issues in Galway County Council is affordable homes. No affordable housing schemes are under way at the moment, apart from a development in Claregalway, which I know is happening. Constituency-wise, Claregalway is in Galway West. It is not outside the county but is not in the eastern side of the county. What are the plans within the Department to support the local authorities? I know the Minister has said it is all about cost. A cost assessment for the area forms the basis of whether the value of the area is determined to be high or low enough for an affordable home scheme.

I raise Portumna as an example. Approximately 2,500 live there. They work locally in the SuperValu and in the factory, but at the same time, if they were to buy a property on the open market, which could cost between €300,000 and €400,000, they cannot afford that. Yet there is no affordable scheme in the area. I know it is down to the local authorities to submit them, but when a local authority is in a position to submit, what can we do? The Minister is coming down hard on local authorities and taking a firm grip on it. What are we saying to local authorities when we have the highest number of children in homelessness and when 3,500 people in the county in need of housing? What does our local authority need to do to actually take a grasp of it?