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

The legislation in question is important and, as the Deputy rightly says, a lot of work and effort went into it in the previous Oireachtas. I was quite critical of parts of the previous heads of Bill that were published and some significant changes have been made in that regard. If one looks at the programme for Government, in the "Housing for All" section, we very clearly define what we want the LDA to do, with a very specific focus on the delivery of public and affordable homes on public land. The priority must be to get it up and running on a statutory footing, a primary legislation footing. That is why I want to get the Bill published in advanced of Christmas. The plan is to do so and move it forward.

The Deputy referred to subsidiaries. It is obviously the intention that any subsidiaries created by the LDA for the purpose of developing State lands - should that happen, as this Bill only gives them the power to do so - would be fully owned by the LDA and therefore by the State. That was a concern we had in the past that will be addressed in this. I want to say very clearly that for the purposes of developing State land, any subsidiaries, should they be established, would be fully owned by the LDA and, therefore, owned by the State

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