Simon Harris (Wicklow, Fine Gael)

Deputy Doherty has decided to continue to ignore the reality with his fanciful economic ideology of the fact that there are at least 42,000 apartments in this capital city that have planning permission today that have been deemed not viable to build. I want to build them while Deputy Doherty wants to continue to call people names. It makes sense to try to ensure those apartments are built because where are the young people going live if they are not built? It suits Deputy Doherty for the housing crisis to continue. We are trying to fix it. Sinn Féin oppose every single measure. Yesterday, when we brought in a measure to try to extend the benefit to approved housing bodies, to extend it to student accommodation and to make sure young people could benefit from the help to buy, Sinn Féin voted níl agus níl. That was Sinn Féin's decision, not ours. We have very different views in relation to this and I am very happy that we do and I am very happy to continue to debate that.

On this amendment, the Government's position is clear. The programme for Government outlines where we want to go with taxation over the lifetime of this Government. The Finance Bill before the House is instalment one of five. I intend to make further progress with taxation measures over the lifetime of this Government and I believe, as do my Government colleagues and as did my predecessor, that the prudent thing to do at the start of a Government is to make sure we increase housing supply because of the housing emergency and to make sure we enact a promise that we made to the hospitality sector and the 190,000 people working in it to help protect their jobs and the viability of their businesses in rural towns and villages right across this country.

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