Damien English (Meath West, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I agree with Deputy Cowen. I would have thought more would have come forward too, but we are only in the first six months of the scheme. I will be honest with the Deputy in that not many people are knocking at my door saying the scheme does not suit them. On the face of it, it is quite a good scheme with quite generous discounts which are now based on a person's income, unlike the discounts in the past that were based on the number of years one was in the house. It is therefore a very good offer. We also must be conscious, however, that there is a shortage of housing stock at the moment so we do not necessarily want a big sale of stock. It is quite a generous tenant purchase scheme, which we can enhance as we improve our supply of housing stock, but I would have thought there would have been more applicants, even with the offer that is there. It is subject to ongoing review. The Deputy speaks of changing something today but it will take until January or February. I am prepared to work with the Deputy on it if he has ideas and solutions, but the scheme is quite generous. Even as it stands, I am surprised it is not working, but we will work on that. Deputy Cowen and I share the same goals.

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