Simon Coveney (Cork South Central, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I take the point in terms of streamlined decision-making and in some cases it may well still be a barrier. Yesterday, I approved €18 million for 56 houses to be built as part of the redevelopment of O'Devaney Gardens in Dublin. This year we will see 4,240 new units in terms of new builds, acquisitions and voids coming back into the system. Do not forget that last year the number of houses built by local authorities in the entire country was 75. We are dramatically ramping up the capacity of local authorities to deliver on social housing build programmes as well as getting voids back into use.

The Deputy is right to stay in the past the decision-making process between the Department and local authorities was not fast enough. There was an eight stage process. When Deputy Kelly was Minister he changed it to a four stage process. I am streamlining this even further to ensure we send teams of people to local authorities to get sign-off in a matter of days on decisions which in the past may have taken months. The Deputy will see significant changes in urgency and the pace of decision-making between the Department and local authorities if he looks at individual projects and the decision-making around them. If this is not happening and the Deputy knows this and has cases where it is not happening, I need to hear about them.

See this speech in context