Naoise Ó Cearúil (Kildare North, Fianna Fail)

I acknowledge the progress made this year to date. The CSO has announced 5,938 home completions happened in quarter 1 of 2025, which is the second highest first quarter since the series began in 2011, and that apartment completions in quarter 1 of 2025 were up 13.4% on quarter 1 of 2024. Many more apartments need to be built and I hope the announcements being made will increase the number being built.

Regarding the NPF, there is a need to be ambitious about not just town and village centres but the outskirts where there is green space available on which to build additional housing and apartments. What is critical, along with the building of homes, is that we build the social infrastructure to go with them. That means schools, childcare and playgrounds, as well as the water and energy we often speak of in here. It is primarily around the building up of sustainable communities.

I look at Kildare North specifically. The waiting lists for childcare in Kildare are astronomical. People are number 400 or number 500 on childcare waiting lists and women cannot plan on going back to work after maternity leave because they cannot secure childcare. It is not sustainable. It is the same with schools. Parents who come to me are worried about getting their child into school for the following year, be it primary or secondary school.

The basics for any community are the likes of playgrounds. There is, for example, no swimming pool in the entirety of north Kildare. All the swimming pools are in the south of the county. My home town, Maynooth, has a population of 17,500, not to mention 17,500 students, and there is no community centre. That does not lend itself to building a sustainable community. When we look at building additional infrastructure in houses, apartments, towns, villages or wherever it may be, it is imperative we look at the social cohesion and the sustainable element of those communities.

We cannot just build shells. Shells are not homes. Homes are defined by the families and individuals within them but the collective living in those homes is what builds the community. Community is at the heart of what this country stands for. We have amazing communities the length and breadth of the country. However, if we do not go down the route of building sustainable communities, we leave ourselves open to societal problems further down the line.

I appeal to the Minister of State and Government. While it is imperative we build as many homes as possible, be they duplexes, houses or apartments, a critical part of that plan is to ensure there is adequate social infrastructure in place. That is schools, crèches, community centres and sports organisations in towns, villages or communities and there must be adequate ground for them to grow as the community grows.

A difficult task lies ahead but progress is being made. We see that by comparing the quarter 1 figures with those from quarter 1 of last year. I ask that a sustained focus be given to sustainable communities.

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