Paul McAuliffe (Dublin North West, Fianna Fail)
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I really appreciate the Department's support, which was key to securing agreement on that site.

That bears comparison with what happened just a week ago at the Oscar Traynor Road site. A full year passed between the decision on O'Devaney Gardens in November 2019 and the vote on the Oscar Traynor Road site in November 2020. It was known that the proposal for O'Devaney Gardens was barely voted through by the council. Was the Department concerned that the time and effort it had put into the Oscar Traynor Road scheme would result in the failure we saw? It is very disappointing all around, but why did both sides not manage in a full year to arrive at a proposal that was at least as good as O'Devaney Gardens? In the event, we got a proposal that was worse than O'Devaney Gardens. How was that project managed during that year? Did the absence of an affordable housing scheme, which was a key element in the uncertainty around this, and the continuing absence of an affordable rental scheme play a major part? I accept that there was no Government for a large part of that year. What did the Department do in the intervening period to prevent the failure which we ultimately saw?