Leo Varadkar (Dublin West, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

The objective here is to make home ownership a reality for more people, particularly young people. Over the next couple of years the Deputy will see many people who have been renting for far too long being able to get their feet on the housing ladder and to buy their first home through the shared equity scheme. For them, in many cases they will pay less on their mortgage than they are currently paying in rent. In the real world where large numbers of people are paying very high rents, they will be able to own a home through the shared equity scheme and to pay a mortgage payment that is less than the rent they are currently paying. That is where people are at, and that is the reality of this scheme on an individual level. The Deputy is going to see that happen and he will see how popular the scheme is as well once it is up and running.

However, this is not the only thing the Government is doing. The main thing we can do to reduce the cost of housing is increase supply. It is very encouraging to see that in the past 12 months over-----

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