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

The Rebuilding Ireland home loan scheme was a measure which was discussed between the Department of Housing, Planning and Local Government and the Department of Finance, as any scheme would be when significant moneys are involved. In this case it was a €200 million fund and, of course, there was back and forth, questioning its merits. The truth is that at the end of that discussion, the two Departments agreed to move forward with it. That is what the record shows. Is anybody who has been in government surprised by the fact that initially the Department of Public Expenditure and Reform would raise robust questions to test the merits of this approach? There is always a robust exchange when the Department of Housing, Planning and Local Government goes to the Department of Public Expenditure and Reform with a new idea and asks it what it thinks. At the end of that, there is an agreement on a way forward which is what happened in this case.

It is a success story so far. It has been only launched several months and we get weekly reports about the level of interest in it. Last week, there were 323 calls, of which 319 were answered. There is a significant interest as one would expect in Dublin. Up to 26% of the calls received were from Dublin and 16% from Cork.

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