Bernard Durkan (Kildare North, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I thank my colleague for sharing time. This is a important issue. If this debate were to be organised again, it would be helpful to have allowed for a longer debate to accommodate Members' contributions. Housing is the issue that has taken up most of our time and concerns when we engaged with constituents over the past seven years. There are a number of reasons for that. I have noted all the points made by previous speakers, some valid and others not so valid. An all-party committee that was set up back in 2014 encouraged all of us in the House to make suggestions on how to deal with the housing issue. I put forward the proposal at that time - it was interesting to see the same suggestion coming from a Deputy on the other side of the House earlier - that AHBs be suspended and everything be devoted towards direct build for tenancy or purchase. There was not a consensus on that suggestion, however, and it did not happen, but it should have happened. If it had been done then, we would not be in the position we are in now. The opportunity could have been taken at that time but events superseded everything and it was not possible to do it in the meantime. It had not been possible to do it prior to that time because the pillar banks were not in a position after the financial crisis to facilitate it. For one reason or another, they did not provide the necessary funding to allow building to take place in the way it should have done.

It is easy to be sceptical and to say at every stage that nothing is being done and nothing will work. We should not forget, as Deputy Lahart alluded to, that there used to be a suggestion that there was a preoccupation with home ownership in this country, which was claimed to be the cause of our housing problems. That is a load of rubbish. The reasons people want to own their own home go back to the Land War and the fight for fixity of tenure, fair rent and so on. It is interesting that those issues are coming up again in conversation in recent times, and rightly so. We have people on "Morning Ireland" telling us they want to rent, do not want to carry a mortgage and this is the way of the future. It is a load of rubbish and propaganda pushed to take people away in a different direction.

We are going in the right direction now, but whether we are doing so in time, I do not know. I believe there is time to address the issues, provided we tweak the legislation as we go along. It will be necessary to increase expenditure in the first year and probably the first three years. If we want a result, we must lay out the expenditure now. It is no good saying what we are going to do in five years. The problem will be worse in five years and we will be back where we are now, still having to make a start. I advise the Minister of State to be mindful of the necessity to increase the focus on expenditure in the first year, which is as and from now.

Deputy Conway-Walsh asked about the eligibility of people who have experienced family breakdown for the Rebuilding Ireland home loan scheme. That needs to be examined as a matter of urgency to ensure the loans are accessible. There is no sense in saying we will spend X amount and then do nothing more. If we want to deal with the situation for first-time buyers, we must look at the definition of who makes up that cohort. First-time buyers are individuals or couples who have not previously owned a house. That needs to be modified somewhat to enable people who are entering into a new contract between themselves to make an application for a loan in that context as opposed to their application being assessed on the basis of their previous arrangement.

Much emphasis has been placed on refurbishing older houses. It is a good idea in some circumstances but not in all. We should be wary of depending on such activity to deliver a host of houses.

The last point I want to make relates to the magnitude of the housing problem. This is a major issue and it has never before been as pressing. Reference was made to escalating prices. I know full well that developers will not pay a particular price for land for development purposes unless they know what they will eventually make a profit on it. The problem I see in this regard relates to certain changes that have been made.

Reference was made to zoning that has taken place. If it was not possible for the developer to know certain matters beforehand, he or she would not make outlandish bids for property because he or she would know there were restrictions in place.

A colleague referred to a site in Dublin city. There is a simple way to deal with that. There is a contract in such situations. The local authority can encourage the developer to enter into a contract containing a condition stipulating that if the developer undertakes to do a certain thing but does not do it, the ball is off. The developer would have no basis for actions such as those described. The land would have been rezoned under false pretences. It has been done previously. There have been many instances of it.

I do not know how much I can cover in the 16 seconds I have remaining.

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