Ms Geraldine Tallon:

We must rely on local authorities to seek to match housing stock in their area to the greatest extent possible to the profile of need within those areas. At a broad level, we can say that we wish to see the unsold affordable houses used productively as quickly as possible and as effectively as possible but it is not realistic for us to seek to match social housing need to exact provision.

Mr. Nugent from the housing division wishes to add something. It is not practical for us at a micro-level to be able to relate specific housing to specific cohorts of need on a local authority’s waiting list because such lists fluctuate on a weekly basis in any event.