Mr. Barry Lynch:

I might just clarify the funding situation on the grants themselves. Earlier in the year we usually get a letter from the Department saying that we can spend a percentage of last year's allocation, so we do not necessarily know what our allocation is until the middle of the year. Later in the year we may get a top-up, depending if we are showing the ability to get through the grants and spend them.

The point I would make is that everyone would like to see more funding coming in but to return to Deputy Ó Broin's point about the waiting list, this is also a labour-intensive operation. As a housing director, I know the people trying to deliver housing programmes are the same people having to send out to have the grants done. Any budget should take account of the fact or should build in a percentage for staff resources to actually do these tasks and that this would help speed up the programme.

Obviously it is important to deal with these emergency situations but the future is about universal design, as Ms. Mc Guigan has said, and we are certainly trying to build that into our planning process.

We could make a recommendation that for any housing schemes they shouldbepro ratato population percentages. If we have 10% elderly in the population, 10% should be dedicated to this group. Certainly in our own Part 8 will be focusing on disabilities, particularly, but we will certainly cater for the same group, the elderly, as well. It is all down to resources funding, capital funding and we need to recommend, as part of the overall Rebuilding Ireland targets, that we set a benchmark for the elderly, in terms of the projects that we bring forward. That would certainly help the situation.

I take the point that has been made about community. It is not always the poor relation and I know several housing authorities that have put housing and community together, including our own, but there is a good synergy. It needs to be done between the two. The activities of the age-friendly alliance, housing and community, the public participation network are all brought under the one department. That is very important and it is the way to go in terms of how local authorities would be structured.