Brian Stanley (Laois, Independent) | Oireachtas source

I welcome the single-stage approval. The lobbyists have been calling for that here for years. I welcome the measure to identify urban development zones. That is the easy bit.

I turn to apartments for a second. Has the Minister ever lived in an apartment that was 32 sq. m? I have not. I lived in a two-bedroom house that was 56 sq. m, which had a small back garden, a very small back yard and a very small front garden, and there was daylight. A total of 32 sq. m is absolutely tiny and the amount of light going into the apartment could be reduced. During the Celtic tiger, we lost sight of quality of life. The Minister's party was in power during that time and there was no focus on quality of life. Are we going through the same thing again? The justification for it is that the apartments are not being built and the developers are walking away, but between June 2023 and March 2024 the number of rental units increased by over 16,000, or 8%. The figures do not seem to stack up. Has the Department sought or done research on the profits of companies that are building apartments? Are the developers losing money or making money? Are they all pauperised or is this just the Construction Industry Federation coming in and looking for more money?

My second question is about students. Aspects of the recent measure that was announced regarding rents are okay in that it could provide some certainty. The problem is changing tenancies. That is what the Minister forgot about. When tenancies are changing, the price of the rent of the unit can be increased significantly. The Minister and I, and everybody else in this room, know that tenancies in the private rented sector change very quickly, and that is separate from students. Unfortunately, students are all out after nine months and have to come back in September to try to acquire another apartment to rent. Can the Minister guarantee that he will provide some measure to protect students? While many people have been forgotten about, students have definitely been forgotten about.

The Minister of State, Deputy Cummins, has left. I raised this issue with him. The Minister has heard me raising it and I raised it with his predecessor, Deputy Darragh O'Brien, too. I think I have some grey hairs on my head from raising it with him. I have also raised it with the Secretary General of the Department, Graham Doyle, at the Committee of Public Accounts. The issue is the need for copy and paste plans. If there is a good design in Wexford, it is okay to build affordable or social housing in Laois to that design. That is how it was done before. Up to 15% of the cost is being added on for the cost of architects. That is what senior staff at local authorities tell us. Let us reduce the costs and speed up. I do not mean to do that in a shambolic way. However, anybody who makes anything, including housing, will tell you that you mass produce. That is what Cairn Homes and so on are doing. They might change the look of the porch, but the homes are basically the same unit. The Minister needs to do the same thing. When representatives of the City and County Management Association were here, they contradicted the Minister of State, Deputy Cummins. They said it is not being used but the Minister of State assured me it is being used.

My last question relates to over-shop units. Over-shop units are going to be very hard to do in many cases because of various issues, including soundproofing, wooden floors, stairs being pulled out, as the Minister mentioned, and fire risks. There are real fire risks. Many of those buildings are three-storey old buildings. They are tinder boxes. Many are beyond repair or difficult to repair. Many have large back gardens and many need to be demolished. The back gardens need to be utilised to create a new small street of maybe six, eight or nine houses. Many have over an acre behind them. Instead of trying to modernise something that is basically a pile of rubble, why are we not trying to create new streets to get people back living in the centre of towns?