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

Obviously, there are two funds here. There is a fund to which the Government has committed €500 million between cities and towns. The Deputy is 100% correct. There are approximately 80,000 planning permissions that have not been activated, many of which are for high-density development or in city areas. The Croí Cónaithe cities fund will be focused at five cities, namely, Dublin, Cork, Limerick, Galway and Waterford. I brought the proposal and memo to Cabinet on Tuesday and we got approval to move to the next stage. That means that within a matter of weeks, we will be launching an open call on the fund. It will provide real assistance for owner-occupiers. It will create viability within those developments. It will be an open call for people to come forward with their proposals, on the condition that those proposals are built out. It will be done on an open-book basis. I know this is something for which the Deputy has advocated strongly, and rightly so because this speaks to ensuring we have compact urban growth and that we actually get some of these sites developed, with people and families living on them. We are only weeks away from the launch. I again thank the Deputy for his interest in this matter.

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