Joan Burton (Dublin West, Labour) | Oireachtas source

In that case, I certainly accept it.

I agree strongly with the points Deputy Donnelly has made. We have similar constituencies in the sense that they have tens of thousands of new homes, many of which were purchased in the period 2000 to 2008. Many of the purchasers are in good jobs and some of the families have two people with jobs. They purchased when prices were at their highest. Where a couple had an apartment, or where each partner had an apartment, as was sometimes the case, they found it impossible to sell.

Many of them have let their apartments and rented. Due to the lack of rent controls, they are renting at increasingly exorbitant rents. The Central Bank should include in its assessment their complex situation and advise the banks to do likewise.

As values rise, negative equity decreases, which is helpful, but we are discussing people who have two or three children and who are the heart and the soul of the community, committed to local schools, doing everything that society expects of them and trying to make successful lives for themselves and their children, and they are in a bind. They are caught between having to rent out an apartment because they cannot sell it yet. I call on the Minister to do something for this group and to advise the Governor of the Central Bank, as I have done in my submission. Otherwise, what will we have learned from the crash? Mr. Chopra, the head of the IMF team, stated repeatedly that it wanted evidence-based policy from Ireland.

I am glad that the Minister is accepting that we need to reassess the help to buy scheme. As such, I will not press the amendment and will instead accept the Minister's proposal, if that is acceptable to other Deputies.

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