Jennifer Carroll MacNeill (Dún Laoghaire, Fine Gael)
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I agree with Dr. Sweeney's final remarks, particularly in regard to those people for whom affordability is an ongoing challenge and for those who are in professions and on a fixed income. For example, a primary school teacher will stay within a particular pay bracket and need certainty around housing, in particular duration of tenancy. This is a big part of the affordable housing Bill that is currently on the table and a large part of the Land Development Agency model. In my own area in Shankill, planning permission granted for 600 homes provides that a chunk of those houses will be used for the cost rental model. In terms of where the opportunity lies, I would be interested in taking up with Dr. Sweeney another time if it is around providing certainty to people in regard to rent, which is the cost of build plus the cost of management, but not profit. That differential enables the State to build more and to retain the asset in perpetuity and thus there will available stock over time. The other advantage is the ability to provide long leases, be that five or ten year leases, which will provide certainty to people that they will not be subject to eviction or rent increases and also access to homes for those over the social housing threshold, people on fixed incomes and at pension stage, who have made changes to their lives. I appreciate this is not a matter which Dr. Sweeney expected to be raised today, but I just wanted to get his perspective on it. There is so much more to the affordable housing Bill.