Noel Ahern (Dublin North West, Fianna Fail)

The Government will not allow the benefits achieved under Part V to be undermined in any way.

It is important to stress that not all housing output in the State is subject to Part V. Regularly, the mistake is made that in viewing output under Part V one simply applies a percentage to the total overall housing output to determine the Part V contribution. This is not the case. The misreading of the matter has led many to jump to erroneous conclusions and wild pronouncements about what Part V should be achieving.

Part V is restricted to multiple housing developments on land zoned for residential use, or a mixture of residential and other uses. The bulk of all housing developments, therefore, are not subject to Part V. It does not apply to planning permissions granted prior to the introduction of Part V, many of which developments have been built in the past several years nor to planning applications on unzoned land or to developments of four units or less. Normal planning permission is valid for five years. Some large estates in large urban areas have seven and ten year planning permissions. It will take time for some of these old planning permissions to work through the system. As the new planning permissions are coming in, Part V will be a significant take from those developments.

Members on the other side of the House are twisting statistics, talking about the percentage of overall development. The number of social housing units built last year was the highest for 20 years.

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