Mr. John O'Connor:

They were at an advanced stage in terms of planning. In terms of delivery, the Skerries site would have been closer to delivery by Fingal County Council. There are a lot of issues in terms of how the Balbriggan lands should be developed. Fingal County Council was just being careful about how it approached that and about the timing and phasing of the development. In terms of long-term control of State lands, it is most important that we do not have a situation in ten or 15 years' time whereby the State does not have land. The Housing Agency lands were effectively funded by the State and our view is that the bulk of the Housing Agency land should be retained in public ownership. In the transfer of that land and the form in which it is done, control should be kept in place. In respect of land from other organisations, for example the HSE, it might be a case that they need funding for other purposes in terms of hospitals and so on. It is a question for the Oireachtas as to the level of State control that should be retained in those sites. The 10% and 30% are minimum figures. The view of the Housing Agency is that in both cases, the social and affordable housing on those sites should be provided at cost. There should not be a land cost in the provision of affordable or social housing on those sites. The land should be subsumed to start with. We need to look at how we are controlling State lands and if one looks at other countries, they tend to keep long-term control. Often it is by way of leasing the land for 100 years or whatever and, depending on the use, whether one has to pay for that or not is dealt with by local authorities or by the State.