Danny Healy-Rae (Kerry, Independent) | Oireachtas source

Nothing has moved on and nothing is moving, and that is the truth of it. I am not happy with the Taoiseach's answer because he moved away from the two questions I asked him to deal with. If he keeps doing that, we will finish up where we are with no house being built. The fact of the matter is that developers cannot access money in this country at present and they do not have money of their own because they have been out of business for the past eight or nine years. That is one problem. The other problem is that the levies, taxes and VAT, which amount to 37% of the cost of the building of the house, must be paid upfront. I ask the Government to intervene here and do something about this. It can have all the pies in the skies and all the notions and all the strategies but they will amount to nothing if it does not deal with the fundamental problem, which is money for the builders to get them going. Maybe if they were rolling for two or three years again, they could keep rolling, but they cannot even start now because they cannot access money. It is not available from any Irish bank, and if they get money, it is at a cost of 10% or 12.5% and it is from outside the country. That is not fair. If the Government does not address these two issues, it can keep developing strategies and printing books and papers, but it will not result in houses and we will finish up where we are, that is, nowhere.

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