Darragh O'Brien (Dublin Fingal, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

If the working group meets toward the end of January, will the Minister of State convey to it our earnest desire to have this concluded as swiftly as possible and that it would come to committee in the first quarter of this year? We all want balanced and appropriate rural development that sustains the rural community. That has to be underpinned by a rural housing policy. Should that need to be revised, which it will, the sooner it is done the better. It should also conform with national planning policy.

There is a lot of interest in this. There has been a lot of discussion about what the Flemish decree will mean for rural housing policy in all our county development plans. I ask the Minister of State to bring that message to the working group at its final meeting this month.

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