Results 11,901-11,920 of 25,999 for speaker:Darragh O'Brien

Select Committee on Housing, Planning and Local Government: Land Development Agency Bill 2021: Committee Stage (Resumed) (27 May 2021)

Darragh O'Brien: My thanks to Deputy Boyd Barrett for his amendments. I will deal with his initial comments first. We are talking here about a commercial semi-state company. It is 100% publicly owned. It is fully accountable to the Oireachtas. There is full oversight. I have ensured that there will be full freedom of information provisions and oversight from the Comptroller and Auditor General. It...

Select Committee on Housing, Planning and Local Government: Land Development Agency Bill 2021: Committee Stage (Resumed) (27 May 2021)

Darragh O'Brien: Again, we discussed this at length on Tuesday. This is about delivery. The main purpose of the LDA will be to deliver affordable and social housing. In many instances, particularly in our urban centres, we will have 100% affordable and social in the sense that entire developments will be made up that mix of housing, particularly in Dublin and in Cork. We need to ensure the agency also has...

Select Committee on Housing, Planning and Local Government: Land Development Agency Bill 2021: Committee Stage (Resumed) (27 May 2021)

Darragh O'Brien: I thank the Deputies for their contributions. No one is talking about offering unaffordable, open market sales at all. Deputy Ó Broin knows that. I intend to align the provisions of Part 9 more closely to the provisions of the recently published Affordable Housing Bill. This significant affordable housing legislation is in the Seanad and will, hopefully, pass Committee Stage...

Select Committee on Housing, Planning and Local Government: Land Development Agency Bill 2021: Committee Stage (Resumed) (27 May 2021)

Darragh O'Brien: I assure Deputy O'Callaghan I am extremely serious about delivering affordable and social homes to the Land Development Agency at scale. That is not just talking about it but actually doing something about it, as colleagues in Fingal County Council did on Tuesday. I do not defend that by the way, but I welcome it. The Deputy will have to explain, as Deputies Ó Broin and Boyd Barrett...

Select Committee on Housing, Planning and Local Government: Land Development Agency Bill 2021: Committee Stage (Resumed) (27 May 2021)

Darragh O'Brien: I will happily respond to that. I was not ignoring the Deputy's question but it relates to the Affordable Housing Bill, which is not the Bill in front of us. It is a matter of caps, not targets. We are not setting affordability at the levels of the caps; rather, we are saying the cap in an area is unaffordable. The measures being introduced in the Affordable Housing Bill, such as shared...

Select Committee on Housing, Planning and Local Government: Land Development Agency Bill 2021: Committee Stage (Resumed) (27 May 2021)

Darragh O'Brien: With respect to Deputy Boyd Barrett, I have answered his question even though it does not relate directly to the group of amendments.

Select Committee on Housing, Planning and Local Government: Land Development Agency Bill 2021: Committee Stage (Resumed) (27 May 2021)

Darragh O'Brien: I fully understand where the Deputies are coming from and I am certainly happy to examine the remit of the agency. Following on from our debate on the previous grouping of amendments, we need to be clear that the LDA is not a housing authority or a planning authority. The primary responsibility for the delivery of homes and of Traveller accommodation is with the local authorities, and I...

Select Committee on Housing, Planning and Local Government: Land Development Agency Bill 2021: Committee Stage (Resumed) (27 May 2021)

Darragh O'Brien: I thank Deputies Ó Broin, Gould and Smith for tabling those two amendments. I fully understand the intent of the amendments. To follow on from what Deputy Boyd Barrett said, I have always been, and continue to be, a full and unambiguous supporter of Traveller-specific accommodation and improving the lot of our Traveller community. The Minister of State, Deputy Peter Burke, has been...

Select Committee on Housing, Planning and Local Government: Land Development Agency Bill 2021: Committee Stage (Resumed) (27 May 2021)

Darragh O'Brien: Deputy Richard Boyd Barrett may have missed my earlier contribution in which I said we will be aligning this Bill with the Affordable Housing Bill. Both are significant Bills. They were introduced by the Government within a year of its establishment. The Land Development Agency Bill was in gestation for years but we have changed it and brought it forward. It will have a genuine impact on...

Select Committee on Housing, Planning and Local Government: Land Development Agency Bill 2021: Committee Stage (Resumed) (27 May 2021)

Darragh O'Brien: I thank the Deputies for tabling this amendment, which is similar but not identical to the previous one. It affords me the opportunity to mention a couple of things with regard to the work I have been doing with my colleague, the Minister, Deputy O'Gorman. I recognise the commitment in the programme for Government to ending direct provision. The Minister, Deputy O'Gorman, has done an...

Select Committee on Housing, Planning and Local Government: Land Development Agency Bill 2021: Committee Stage (Resumed) (27 May 2021)

Darragh O'Brien: I appreciate Deputy Ó Broin's remarks. More work is needed on the amendment. As drafted, it asks that land be provided for the provision of accommodation for those from the asylum application process. I am sure that like me Deputy Ó Broin would not like to see any unintended consequences arising from the designation of land within a development for asylum seekers. That would be...

Select Committee on Housing, Planning and Local Government: Land Development Agency Bill 2021: Committee Stage (Resumed) (27 May 2021)

Darragh O'Brien: I will probably need about a half an hour to respond to that diatribe. We may have to come back to it at the next meeting. There were so many untruths and incorrect comments but there were also some elements we could address. There was one element with regard to the wording as drafted at which I will commit to looking. We will need to look at the whole section together, however. We...

Select Committee on Housing, Planning and Local Government: Land Development Agency Bill 2021: Committee Stage (Resumed) (27 May 2021)

Darragh O'Brien: I welcome that but I will leave the matter to the committee to discuss and decide.

Select Committee on Housing, Planning and Local Government: Land Development Agency Bill 2021: Committee Stage (Resumed) (1 Jun 2021)

Darragh O'Brien: We have had some discussion on this group of amendments. I have given a commitment to Deputy Boyd Barrett that I will take another look at the word "undue" and I will do that and revert to him, although it is a matter for the Deputy as to how he proposes to proceed with the amendment. Amendments Nos. 9 and 38, are jointly tabled by Deputies Ó Broin and Gould and amendments Nos. 10,...

Select Committee on Housing, Planning and Local Government: Land Development Agency Bill 2021: Committee Stage (Resumed) (1 Jun 2021)

Darragh O'Brien: I can clarify that I propose to accept Deputy O'Callaghan's amendment No. 83 which is not in this grouping, but is a good amendment. That amendment refers to ensuring "the timely delivery of infrastructure in advance or in tandem with the delivery of housing". I am suggesting we take amendment No. 83 and add in "and communities" after "the delivery of housing". Basically we would insert it...

Select Committee on Housing, Planning and Local Government: Land Development Agency Bill 2021: Committee Stage (Resumed) (1 Jun 2021)

Darragh O'Brien: Whereabouts?

Select Committee on Housing, Planning and Local Government: Land Development Agency Bill 2021: Committee Stage (Resumed) (1 Jun 2021)

Darragh O'Brien: The Deputy might let me know if he is referencing one as an example. It is important to back it up. That is all.

Select Committee on Housing, Planning and Local Government: Land Development Agency Bill 2021: Committee Stage (Resumed) (1 Jun 2021)

Darragh O'Brien: Can I respond briefly, Chairman?

Select Committee on Housing, Planning and Local Government: Land Development Agency Bill 2021: Committee Stage (Resumed) (1 Jun 2021)

Darragh O'Brien: I wish to make a couple of points. I have said to members that they should read the purposes of the Act section in its entirety because each of the points in it are related. In many instances what is being proposed by the speakers would perpetrate segregation by insisting on mono-tenure or purely public housing on public land. We cannot have it both ways. We need a mix of affordable...