Joan Burton (Dublin West, Labour) | Oireachtas source

To continue the point on housing and the infrastructure required for it, I could bring the Minister to an area he knows well in my constituency, Hansfield in Ongar. Over the past ten years, planning permission has been given for another 3,000 houses there, in a very desirable area, where most of them would be for purchase. Small-scale building is happening there at present but some investment in road infrastructure was required. These 3,000 houses on the west side of Dublin would make quite a difference to supply. There has been much school building in the area also, yet there is no funding for a small element of an access road and a bridge over the canal. This is very difficult to understand, now that things have improved so much. I appreciate the volume of capital investment has increased, but it is nothing like what is actually required. I do not think anybody in government has really got a handle on how to ramp up the volume and the amount of infrastructure that is required.

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