Results 1,041-1,060 of 50,909 for speaker:Micheál Martin

Ceisteanna ó Cheannairí - Leaders' Questions (29 Apr 2025)

Micheál Martin: I appreciate the Deputy raising this issue again. Some 7,100 affordable housing solutions were delivered in 2024, exceeding the delivery target of 6,400. Since we came into office in 2020, nearly 13,000 affordable housing options have been delivered by the various delivery partners. Help to buy has helped young people to afford to buy first time new-build houses. Bridge the gap has also...

Ceisteanna ó Cheannairí - Leaders' Questions (29 Apr 2025)

Micheál Martin: As I said, there is a plan. In the past five years, we provided 11 new special schools and five more are set for 2025-26. On the High Court decision some years ago in respect of preliminary assessments or the then system organised by the HSE, the experts have come back to the Government and stated that it has compounded the delay and backlog relating to assessments of need. The...

Ceisteanna ó Cheannairí - Leaders' Questions (29 Apr 2025)

Micheál Martin: I thank the Deputy for raising this very important issue which is top of the Government's priorities, namely, special needs in general and especially special needs education. I make the point special education now accounts for about 28% of the entire education budget. That is a 48% increase in four years since 2020. Staffing has grown 27%, with 23,400 special needs assistants now in our...

Ceisteanna ó Cheannairí - Leaders' Questions (29 Apr 2025)

Micheál Martin: That includes €450 million for a further 3,000 affordable and social homes and €325 million in respect of second-hand acquisitions, incorporating the tenant in situ scheme and the provision for that. Since 2023 alone-----

Ceisteanna ó Cheannairí - Leaders' Questions (29 Apr 2025)

Micheál Martin: -----over 3,300 homes have been acquired through second-hand acquisitions, as they are called, by local authorities across the country. We have published the national planning framework since coming back into office, which will facilitate the zoning of a considerably greater degree of land. I hope Sinn Féin will support that on local authorities across the country and get rid of its...

Ceisteanna ó Cheannairí - Leaders' Questions (29 Apr 2025)

Micheál Martin: The heads of the short-term lets Bill have been brought to Cabinet-----

Ceisteanna ó Cheannairí - Leaders' Questions (29 Apr 2025)

Micheál Martin: -----and approved by Cabinet.

Ceisteanna ó Cheannairí - Leaders' Questions (29 Apr 2025)

Micheál Martin: The Government decided today to establish the housing activation office. No decision has been taken as to who will head up that office but the person will be seconded from within the public service. That is an intention, which basically means there will be no additional cost in salary or whatever-----

Ceisteanna ó Cheannairí - Leaders' Questions (29 Apr 2025)

Micheál Martin: -----to housing - or to anybody, for that matter - in terms of a secondment-----

Ceisteanna ó Cheannairí - Leaders' Questions (29 Apr 2025)

Micheál Martin: -----within the public service. That is the objective, but no decision has been made, so I am not in a position to confirm anything to Deputy McDonald today in that respect.

Ceisteanna ó Cheannairí - Leaders' Questions (29 Apr 2025)

Micheál Martin: I wish to confirm to the Deputy that the Central Statistics Office on Thursday - and the Deputy is good for giving her side or perspective all the time - indicated that close to 6,000 new homes were completed in the first quarter of 2025, which is the second highest first quarter delivery since the day the series began in 2011 and a 2% increase on the first quarter of 2024. It is a figure...

Ceisteanna ó Cheannairí - Leaders' Questions (29 Apr 2025)

Micheál Martin: That is not surprising because she did not in any shape or form want to point to any figures that would give some degree of positive reality. We want to build far more and we acknowledge that we have far more to build. The Deputy has a record of opposing well over 1,000 houses in her own constituency.

Ceisteanna ó Cheannairí - Leaders' Questions (29 Apr 2025)

Micheál Martin: She has put her own constituency needs above and beyond the housing-----

Ceisteanna ó Cheannairí - Leaders' Questions (29 Apr 2025)

Micheál Martin: She did. She objected to well over 1,000 houses in her constituency.

Ceisteanna ó Cheannairí - Leaders' Questions (29 Apr 2025)

Micheál Martin: It is a bit rich of her to come in here on a daily basis ranting about housing when her own record in respect of giving it the ultimate priority that it deserves is fairly poor in terms of her performance.

Ceisteanna ó Cheannairí - Leaders' Questions (29 Apr 2025)

Micheál Martin: The programme for Government-----

Ceisteanna ó Cheannairí - Leaders' Questions (29 Apr 2025)

Micheál Martin: -----is clear in its decision. The programme ordained that we would set up a housing activation office because we are going to consistently add to the initiatives we have taken in housing-----

Ceisteanna ó Cheannairí - Leaders' Questions (29 Apr 2025)

Micheál Martin: -----and we make no apologies for doing further in terms of-----

Ceisteanna ó Cheannairí - Leaders' Questions (29 Apr 2025)

Micheál Martin: I could not disagree more with the Deputy on her critique of Government housing policy. The bottom line is that if we look over the past four years, there has been a very significant step change in the level and scale of housing delivery in this country. On social housing alone, more than 48,000 houses have been to the social housing stock.

Ceisteanna ó Cheannairí - Leaders' Questions (29 Apr 2025)

Micheál Martin: Not since the 1970s have we seen that level and scale of social house building and social house provision. Those are the facts. We need to do far more than that but, without question, the number of social houses built in the past three to four years is without compare and we would have to go back to the 1970s to get similar levels of social house completion.