Dr. David Duffy:

We have not specifically had interaction with the Department on Brexit contingency plans, though we have had significant interaction on what measures are needed to address the issues in the housing market. We are also concerned that Home Building Finance Ireland still has not come to market because we need small and medium-sized builders to deliver houses into the market. Large-scale developments are not a solution on their own.

On the measures needed to improve the cost of delivery, the surveyors' report illustrated clearly that there is no silver bullet. A range of measures across funding, finance and the cost of land is needed to address the cost of delivery. In the housing market, which is sentiment-driven, the help-to-buy scheme is playing an important role by giving more confidence about the demand levels that are there. Confidence about demand results in confidence about supply and because homebuilders know demand is there, they are prepared to deliver houses. Moving from phase one to phase two has been quicker as a result. The other impact of the scheme, about which I heard through interaction with some of our members, is in the way certainty of demand has brought about certainty of funding, which has helped deliver supply. The scheme could be a demand-side measure but it is probably having more of an impact on the supply side by bringing that certainty.

There are probably a number of reasons for the difference in population projections. The 2025 estimate was probably based on the 2011 census while the 36,000 is based on the 2016 census. It is just a question of the passage of time between the preparation of the two sets of estimates.