Paul McAuliffe (Dublin North West, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I welcome the Minister of State outlining some of the many things contained in Housing for All, the Affordable Housing Act 2021, the Land Development Agency Act 2021 and the many other measures that he mentioned. We need to go further and start to make sure that every local authority knows the breadth and depth of this housing plan, that every local authority knows how much is in here and that every councillor has an understanding that there are tools in this housing plan that will allow them to progress the projects which they might have been frustrated at being unable to develop. I welcome the two days we have spent with our housing directors and I know each of the Ministers will be speaking to the councillors in their parties. I also welcome the Taoiseach’s comments that local authorities and councillors have to treat this issue, in its implementation, as an emergency. We have to make sure we get to a position where we start building homes and that will involve sacrifices and challenges for all of us. The biggest challenge that is faced is by the executives in the AHBs and, particularly, in the local authorities.

More than 250 additional staff have been provided across the country but there has not been any additional staff provided to Dublin yet. That is because, as the assistant secretary general at the Department informed our committee, they are waiting for the housing needs and demands assessment to be completed and they will be in a better position at that point to identify the numbers that are required. We need additional staff in Dublin and everybody accepts that. The local authorities need to tell us how many staff they need and they need to ensure that is approved by the Department. We have to get those staff in place and get to work on all of the sites I mentioned.

Thousands of homes could be delivered in my constituency alone. That is what progress and Housing for All will look like. It will not be a list of policy instruments, but a list of sites where homes are being developed and a list of families who are able to call those places home. It will be places that we will be able to call communities. I am not criticising Government policy. I am not even criticising progress at this point, but I am saying we need to make sure that ambition is one of the core points of the local authorities in how they deliver this plan.

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