Simon Harris (Wicklow, Fine Gael)

I really appreciate that because this united Opposition thing gets presented a lot, but there are different voices and different perspectives. The Deputy is the first Member of the Opposition who has critiqued the Government for not going further with our VAT reduction measure. The rest of them have slated us for doing anything at all in respect of it. That is a point of difference. When you are in government, you are trying to get these balances correct.

We made a decision that the acute viability issue related to apartments. We had to make a balanced decision about the composition of the overall package of what was available with regard to tax, and we continue to monitor that. We are encouraged by what we are seeing and by what the industry has said to the Government and to the Oireachtas housing committee in recent weeks.

On the issue of serviced and zoned land, with the residential zoned land tax, which has not been without challenge by farmers and others, issues which we are working through, as the Minister, Deputy Heydon knows, we have seen a significant increase in transactions. In other words, people are not sitting on residential zoned land. That is encouraging. The Minister of State, Deputy Cummins, with the Minister, Deputy Browne, has issued section 28, which is basically to instruct our councils to zone enough land for at least 83,000 houses. This is not rocket science. You have to over-zone because, obviously, not every zoned site converts into homes. It took a little too long for some local authorities to get that point. That is why the Taoiseach, the Minister of State, Deputy Cummins, the Minister, Deputy Browne, and I are meeting each of the local authorities' chief executives in small groups. We have met four so far.

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