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

In the housing crisis vein, and accepting that it is a crisis, I put to the Taoiseach earlier the regulatory framework governing the submission by local authorities of housing schemes to the Department of Communications, Climate Action and Environment and the inexplicable delays in sanctioning such projects. If it is an emergency and a crisis, surely that framework should be changed. The idea that a council that wants to build ten houses at a cost of anything more than €2 million has to submit those plans to the Department, go through a four-stage process and a 59 week timetable is ridiculous, if we accept it is a crisis. Housing schemes submitted as far back as last February have not been sanctioned. That is why I ask the question: do people not get it? This is a real crisis.

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