Mr. Patrick Davitt:

Obviously, we have a view on it, and we are all for that. However, we have come before the committee to talk about taxation measures, it seems we want to do away with all these initiatives. We are on the side of increasing those initiatives. When reading the document, it seems the only way the tax base is going to be extended is by cutting the taxes and allowances we have now. What the Deputy is talking about is well outside of that and is something we are well prepared to look at. I refer to allowances in capital gains and section 23 relief. That has worked very well in the past and will work very well in the future, but allowances and tax incentives should be given, in the form of capital gains tax, building taxes, or anything that will encourage people to sell those vacant houses and to let people buy them, live in them, make use of them, and bring them into the building stock, or develop the land to make new housing.

I refer to way the property market is and the way building costs have gone. People in many rural towns are looking for apartments to be built. Most people know they cannot build apartments in rural towns because the cost is so high. They end up with a two-bedroom apartment in Macroom, as the Deputy said, or somewhere else-----