Leo Varadkar (Dublin West, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I, as Taoiseach, and everyone in this House understands the depth of the housing crisis, whether for a generation of people who are renting, who want to buy but struggle to put together a deposit or find a property to buy or for people waiting years for council houses or for people who have to spend time in emergency accommodation. I agree with Deputy McDonald on one point, which is that the underlying problem is a lack of housing supply. We have a country that has a growing population. The population grew by more than 60,000 people last year through natural increases and inward migration and as a result of Irish people who had left coming home. When the population increases by about 60,000 a year it stands to reason that we need to build many new homes every year, probably about 30,000 to 35,000, and we are not doing that yet. If it were possible to ramp up house building overnight with a soundbite-----

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