Ciarán Cuffe (Dún Laoghaire, Green Party)

——they and their colleagues helped to create a large part of the problems that NAMA is attempting to solve. In considering the Bill before us, it is time for Fine Gael to think long and hard about how best to address the mistakes that were made during the boom years. To that end, I reiterate that the Minister for Finance, Deputy Brian Lenihan, and the Minister for the Environment, Heritage and Local Government, Deputy John Gormley, are producing significant measures that will help ensure that the mistakes of overzoning and housing estates in the middle of nowhere, that I suspect we will demolish over the coming years, will not be repeated.

There were faults and mistakes in what went on in the late 1990s and early 2000s. Blanket tax incentives in the upper Shannon area were a mistake because developers and investors threw money into schemes to reduce their taxes but did not think long and hard about whether the development was the right type of development in the right type of place. I would like to look forward to a day when Fine Gael will strongly commit itself to proper planning and sustainable development. The Labour Party is good on planning and many of the ideas it has brought to the public debate and its work in the Dublin area and elsewhere have been very positive. I recognise the intent of the amendment. It is worthy but it is covered in many of the measures which the Minister is bringing forward and which my colleague, Deputy Gormley, will bring to the House.

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