Richard Boyd Barrett (Dún Laoghaire, People Before Profit Alliance) | Oireachtas source

As the mover of most of the amendments in this group, I will respond to the Minister. Many of the contributions probably were not directly to do with the amendments but that shows the frustration Members feel about housing in every area. Members are just looking for every opportunity to raise this issue because it is such a pressing crisis.

I agree with the Minister that there is a fundamental difference between many in the Opposition and the Government.

I have only a short time available to speak so I will focus on the real questions. What is the problem we have to fix? Is it that local authorities just did not bother to build council housing for the past 20 years or is it that central government did not give them the money and support to do it? The answer is the latter. The councils and elected councillors knew and were pushing all the time. I did nothing else before I was a councillor, when I was a councillor and now as a Deputy other than constantly campaign for council housing. Central government would not provide the money to do it. The Minister said the LDA is not going to usurp the role of local authorities. The first development likely to be produced by the LDA, Shanganagh Castle, is in my constituency and should have been developed by the council a decade ago but central government did not give the council the money and the development has now been handed over to the LDA. It has already usurped Dún Laoghaire-Rathdown County Council and, as a consequence, we do not know if the affordable housing built on the site will be genuinely affordable.

I have only a few seconds left to speak to this group of amendments so I cannot elaborate the points. The debate is going to be guillotined despite the fact that we have proposed 60 or 70 amendments. If that guillotine falls, most of our amendments will not be discussed but the Minister's amendments will be passed automatically.

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