Mick Wallace (Wexford, Independent) | Oireachtas source

NAMA has nominated Cerberus as the preferred bidder for Project Arrow. The deal has not yet gone through so I do not understand why the Government does not take some of the built units which are ready for use. I can live with the idea of the developer providing 10% of the units instead of 20% because it would be particularly difficult for small builders to finance it if they provide 20% and lose money. Of the 90% that the builder retains for the private sector, the State should buy a large chunk to give to the local authorities for social housing. It would make a massive difference. It is not good enough that NAMA is building 20,000 units in the Dublin area in the next few years and only 2,000 of them are going to social housing. The State should buy more of them and give them to the local authorities. The waiting list in Dublin increased to 21,592 in July 2015, which is a 25% increase from July 2014. This is a major problem. We need local authority social housing units.

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