Micheál Martin (Cork South Central, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I asked the Taoiseach if he thought it was an emergency and that we were in a crisis. I also asked him to explain the absence of delivery across a range of schemes that his Government had announced in the past four years that had not been delivered. If we are in an urgent crisis, as we are, the simplest problem to tackle is the inexplicable delay in the approval of housing schemes submitted by local authorities to the Department of the Communications, Climate Action and Environment. It takes about 59 weeks. Anything that will cost over €2 million has to be sent to Dublin. Why is the Government paying the CEOs of local authorities? Why is it paying whole teams in the housing departments of local authorities? Given the urgency of the issue, it should be telling local authorities to build 500 houses and get it done. It could be audited afterwards, but this is an emergency, a crisis. It is beyond belief that housing schemes in Kilnamanagh submitted 12 months ago are still awaiting approval in principle from the Department in the legendary four-stage process. Does anybody in government get it? Does anybody in officialdom get it? Every Deputy knows people who call in every week, in desperation, knowing that there will be no house for them in three or four weeks' time when they will be evicted, yet there are these long, unacceptable delays. They should not have to be sent to the Department, given the emergency we are in.

Will the Taoiseach explain the Poolbeg development which was announced by the Tánaiste, Deputy Simon Coveney, in 2015. He said the pace with which it would be delivered would surprise us.

The public private partnership for the supply of social housing was announced by Deputy Alan Kelly in 2015.

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