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

We have delivered the most comprehensive affordable housing legislation that any Government has ever brought forward. That affordable housing legislation was supported by all in this House with the exception of eight Deputies. Deputy Cian O'Callaghan was one of those eight Deputies who voted against affordable housing for working people. He voted against cost rental, against affordable purchase delivered by local authorities and against the Home First shared equity scheme. Let us put that on record.

We are not going to turn ten years of undersupply around overnight. We need to put the building blocks in place like the Affordable Housing Act to deliver affordable housing for working people. We are going to do that this year. On top of that, we want to develop State-owned land, some of which we have mentioned here, some of the unfortunately infamous sites. We brought forward the Land Development Agency Act, revised the Land Development Agency and capitalised it to be able to deliver public homes on State-owned land. I remind the Deputy that in Cork and Dublin, it is 100% social and affordable. Again that is legislation that he and his party opposed. It is his absolute right to do so should he wish. However, without the policies in place backed by the money we have put in place through Housing for All, we are not going to deliver any affordable homes. We are delivering them. This year will see a significant number of affordable homes delivered from a base of zero.

See this speech in context