Brian Stanley (Laois-Offaly, Sinn Fein)

As this is my maiden speech please give me a chance. I had a hard job getting here. What is equally unacceptable is the fact that local authorities are being told by central government to rent houses for social housing from the same property developers who created the crisis in the first place. Half-finished estates must be completed and occupied. This is an opportunity to provide work for the thousands of unemployed tradesmen and tradeswomen and building workers throughout the State. If these estates were completed, some of the vacant units in them and the unfinished housing units could be used for social and affordable housing at knockdown rates. The residents who live in these half-finished estates would benefit if whole estates were completed properly. I do not want to hear from the Government benches and the Minister for the Environment, Community and Local Government, Deputy Phil Hogan, that they cannot intervene in this matter as it involves private estates or is a market issue. The bondholders were also a private matter but that did not stop the previous Government or the current Government putting in billions of euro to make good their losses. Unfortunately, this Government is following the same path. Ministers cannot have any inhibitions about intervening in the housing market and putting in place a proper action plan to deal with the unfinished estates. The new Government must act to address this scandal. Unfortunately, there are only three lines in the programme for Government which shows that this issue is not being given the attention it needs. We need the Government to show it is serious about the issues of housing and employment. We cannot allow the status quo to be retained. The banks have been bailed out. It is now time for the people to receive their bailout. We need to get people housed and to get Ireland back to work.

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