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

My Department engages on a continuous basis with local authorities in regard to the advancement of all social housing construction projects.  That is done at both a Departmental and Ministerial level. Deputy Casey has attended meetings at which we tried to engage with officials and local authority members to impress upon them the urgency of moving these projects toward completion and spending the money that has been allocated to social housing projects. That work is ongoing. I appreciate the Deputy's assistance in that regard.

The Department meets with each local authority on a quarterly basis, with a focus on accelerating projects, addressing issues that might give rise to delays and ensuring projects are delivered in a high quality and value-for-money manner as speedily as possible. There are now over 600 social housing construction projects, which will deliver over 10,000 social housing units, listed in the status report on social housing construction projects. Not everyone agrees with those figures but they are facts and can be checked. I have dealt with Deputy Ó Broin's facts before and they are not always correct.

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