Bertie Ahern (Dublin Central, Fianna Fail)

There are at least two planning Bills, one published and one not, where a number of issues relating to property rights have been taken into account. Other issues have been addressed in other legislation. I accept the Deputy's point that we are told every year that there will be no more price increases. The affordable housing initiative does not require legislation and we have given the go-ahead for several initiatives recommended by the report. Our legal advice was that we could advertise for people to come forward with suitable property. There has been a good take-up and many property owners have put their land forward for affordable housing. I do not know if that was facilitated by an old Act but it did not require legislation. The advertisements were for land that would not otherwise have been zoned for residential housing. That land can now be used for affordable housing purposes and hopefully will prove to be effective in time. I accept that developers, banks and building societies continually state that this year will see a huge drop in numbers but the changes made certainly are not creating problems. As the Minister for Transport, Deputy Cullen, said, one of the arguments made at the end of every year, is that the population keeps growing.

I did not answer the question on Northern Ireland. I have listened to what everybody said and taken account of the views of all the parties, several of which have reservations about the proposal. I am currently considering those responses and will return with a different proposal. It is obvious the House will not agree to anything other than Northern parties attending committees to make presentations and discuss issues in the normal way.

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