Alan Kelly (Tipperary North, Labour) | Oireachtas source

I am perplexed by the Deputy's analysis. The social housing strategy represents the launch of the largest programme of housing investment in the history of the State, one of the largest programmes of house building by any Government. The Deputy's concerns about the outsourcing of the approved housing bodies, AHBs, worries me.

The approved housing bodies, AHBs, have made a huge contribution in terms of social housing requirements and, in fairness, a number of people across the House have acknowledged that. I know they would not concur with the Deputy's statements. Through the programme I announced last week we are having to bring about a range of measures to ensure that people's housing needs are met by way of the housing assistance payment, HAP, which will be brought out across the country, but also in the long term through the construction programme I announced as part of that to deal with the core issue, which is supply. We do need more houses that are owned by the State and in the plan I announced, given the capital available to do so, and I got all the capital that was possible in terms of a Minister in my position, it is a huge plus for the future that we will have the level of local authority and social housing units built to meet that supply.

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