Mattie McGrath (Tipperary, Independent) | Oireachtas source

I thank the Acting Chair for her forbearance in allowing us back in. We were late for our slot for one reason or another. I do not know what happened, since I was watching the debate, but sin scéal eile. I will follow on from what Deputy Healy-Rae said about Sinn Féin and objections.

Sinn Féin espouses what Deputy Ó Broin says and always listens to what he says about Housing for All, ideas, etc. I sat on the housing committee for five years, and they were the most difficult five years I ever had. Talk is great, but talk is cheap. Even though we are building houses now, control has gone away from local authorities and the people.

I salute a local builder from my area, Mr. Michael Flannery. He has done a great deal of building, including one-off houses and small extensions, and is now building entire housing schemes. He is a good, young, hard-working and energetic man. I have had many a row with him over various issues, including planning, but he is a worker. He took to the airwaves last week, appearing on Mr. Fran Curry's show on Tipp FM where he made a whole pile of sense. Mr. Curry was good to listen to him and engage with him. Mr. Flannery set out the problems and blockages - the bureaucracy, objections and costs - stopping us from building houses. He is building houses, to be fair to him. We cannot demonise all small builders and developers. I suppose we could call him a small developer, but developers are necessary. We always had them and they were encouraged, but now there is bureaucracy with the Office of the Planning Regulator, the EPA and the Van Diemen's Land of An Bord Pleanála. An Bord Pleanála has been an utter scandal for the past ten years and perhaps much longer. The matters that have come to light now are shocking. There are serial objectors.

I welcome the waiver of planning charges for the 12-month period. Many people got caught on the wrong side of it, but that is the way of all schemes, as they have finite times.

Mr. Flannery put it clearly. It was great to hear from a man who was in the business. He has to face everything. We in this House think we are great when we increase the minimum wage or the number of bank holidays with Lá Fhéile Bríde. We will have even more of it. There is extra sick pay. I am not anti-worker. I wish to declare that I have 25 employees in my own company. We have good relationships with them. Now, we in this House want paternity leave and to again introduce in a blaze of glory the five days of leave to do with domestic violence. I do not know what the right terminology is. How can any small builder or other employer continue working like this? It is just not possible. Look at all the health and safety measures that have been introduced. Some of them have been necessary, but it is over the top completely. There are legions of fellas and women going around now with briefcases who are inspectors of this, that and the other. They could not lay a block upon a block or even draw a picture of a block upon a block, but they know everything and they penalise the employers who are trying to be providers and enablers.

What is the Government doing to deal with pyrite and mica instead of penalising CRH? That company has been found guilty of crimes all over the world. It has been fined $100 million in some countries, but nothing at all here because Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael have been in its pockets for decades. Ask Mr. Seamus Maye about that and he will say it. There is a court case ongoing and there has been a fight for justice for 30 years. We put a levy on concrete to drive up the cost of houses again instead of dealing with the problem. We have a problem with bureaucracy and corruption. I have to say what is happening in that situation and many others.

Some 85% or 90% of the apartments in last year’s figures for new homes that the Minister of State, Deputy Noonan, and the Minister, Deputy O’Brien, cite have been bought up by vulture funds. To hell with the Irish people. The figures are fictitious. That is why we have so many people homeless.

Then there are the Minister of State’s fine-weather friends in An Taisce, which is a serial objector. We saw what it did to the factory in Callan. An Taisce is anti-business. It is against people getting homes. Its people are all well heeled. They came down to north Tipperary and the lake opposite Killaloe and built fine houses hanging out into the lake. Now they are perched there like an eagle. If anyone else comes along, they pick him or her out and throw him or her into the sea. I am all right, Jack, and to hell with the ordinary people. Local people want to build in that vicinity, but now the people from An Taisce are there up in their fine big mansions, well paid and well heeled. An Taisce should be disbanded. Now, it did good work with Tidy Towns and other initiatives-----

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