Results 15,701-15,720 of 26,902 for speaker:Richard Boyd Barrett
- Ceisteanna - Questions: Cabinet Committee Meetings (9 Nov 2016)
Richard Boyd Barrett: 3. To ask the Taoiseach the number of times the Cabinet committee on European affairs has met; and if he will provide its forward schedule of meetings. [33564/16]
- Select Committee on Finance, Public Expenditure and Reform, and Taoiseach: Finance Bill 2016: Committee Stage (9 Nov 2016)
Richard Boyd Barrett: Most of the points have been made. This is a new variation on an old and failed theme when the supply of housing in whatever form it takes that people can afford based on their incomes needs to be increased. The Government is instead returning to an old theme, which is to incentivise developers with tax breaks relating to property. The tax break in this case is hoped to increase supply and...
- Select Committee on Finance, Public Expenditure and Reform, and Taoiseach: Finance Bill 2016: Committee Stage (9 Nov 2016)
Richard Boyd Barrett: That is the problem.
- Select Committee on Finance, Public Expenditure and Reform, and Taoiseach: Finance Bill 2016: Committee Stage (9 Nov 2016)
Richard Boyd Barrett: Could the Minister say that again?
- Select Committee on Finance, Public Expenditure and Reform, and Taoiseach: Finance Bill 2016: Committee Stage (9 Nov 2016)
Richard Boyd Barrett: I am surprised by what Deputy Doherty said, although I take his figures seriously on effective demand in the figures for people getting mortgage approval. I would have thought there was a huge problem with effective demand, not just in the ability to gather together a deposit but with regard to the multiples. The evidence for this was very apparent to me when I went to the teachers'...
- Select Committee on Finance, Public Expenditure and Reform, and Taoiseach: Finance Bill 2016: Committee Stage (9 Nov 2016)
Richard Boyd Barrett: My solution is to control prices. The State has to deliver large-scale rental or affordable housing through local authorities, mortgage schemes run by the State and so on. The State should control at least a significant amount of the housing stock to provide for people who cannot afford, on their current salaries, what the market is going to charge them.
- Select Committee on Finance, Public Expenditure and Reform, and Taoiseach: Finance Bill 2016: Committee Stage (9 Nov 2016)
Richard Boyd Barrett: I just gave the example of Cherrywood. It is not going to happen in Cherrywood.
- Select Committee on Finance, Public Expenditure and Reform, and Taoiseach: Finance Bill 2016: Committee Stage (9 Nov 2016)
Richard Boyd Barrett: I just want to correct one part of that.
- Select Committee on Finance, Public Expenditure and Reform, and Taoiseach: Finance Bill 2016: Committee Stage (9 Nov 2016)
Richard Boyd Barrett: We have no control over what they charge.
- Select Committee on Finance, Public Expenditure and Reform, and Taoiseach: Finance Bill 2016: Committee Stage (9 Nov 2016)
Richard Boyd Barrett: I will state the very obvious point. Even with the 10% being spoken about by the Minister, they will build it. It will be sold or leased back to local authorities at a discount on the market price. We do not even know what a reasonable profit is in the legislation, and that is how it is defined. It will be relative to the market prices in south Dublin, which are off the scale. Even the...
- Select Committee on Finance, Public Expenditure and Reform, and Taoiseach: Finance Bill 2016: Committee Stage (9 Nov 2016)
Richard Boyd Barrett: It is very unlikely.
- Select Committee on Finance, Public Expenditure and Reform, and Taoiseach: Finance Bill 2016: Committee Stage (9 Nov 2016)
Richard Boyd Barrett: I support the proposal for a report on the cost of housing. Deputy McGrath referred specifically to the cost in the private sector but I think we need to know the cost of the State building housing too. I have tabled several parliamentary questions on this in recent years and the figures I get vary significantly. We need to compare the costs of public sector and private sector building to...
- Select Committee on Finance, Public Expenditure and Reform, and Taoiseach: Finance Bill 2016: Committee Stage (9 Nov 2016)
Richard Boyd Barrett: I cite that as an example of the different costs there are for building housing, which is precisely relevant to the section.
- Select Committee on Finance, Public Expenditure and Reform, and Taoiseach: Finance Bill 2016: Committee Stage (9 Nov 2016)
Richard Boyd Barrett: Four houses for €360,000.
- Select Committee on Finance, Public Expenditure and Reform, and Taoiseach: Finance Bill 2016: Committee Stage (9 Nov 2016)
Richard Boyd Barrett: It is less than that.
- Select Committee on Finance, Public Expenditure and Reform, and Taoiseach: Finance Bill 2016: Committee Stage (9 Nov 2016)
Richard Boyd Barrett: Yes, €90,000 each.
- Select Committee on Finance, Public Expenditure and Reform, and Taoiseach: Finance Bill 2016: Committee Stage (9 Nov 2016)
Richard Boyd Barrett: This is a proposal which Dún Laoghaire-Rathdown County Council has taken up. There are different ways of delivering housing and these are high specification, environmentally advanced housing units. Any study in this area needs to examine all the different models of delivering housing and make a comparison between them.
- Select Committee on Finance, Public Expenditure and Reform, and Taoiseach: Finance Bill 2016: Committee Stage (9 Nov 2016)
Richard Boyd Barrett: Sorry, Minister------
- Select Committee on Finance, Public Expenditure and Reform, and Taoiseach: Finance Bill 2016: Committee Stage (9 Nov 2016)
Richard Boyd Barrett: This is related to the finances of the State. The reason I put forward the proposal is that we need the study to be comparative. I am referring to not only council housing but affordable housing. If it turns out that we can deliver affordable housing for purchase much cheaper by the State providing it directly, then we need to know that as part of any serious study.
- Select Committee on Finance, Public Expenditure and Reform, and Taoiseach: Finance Bill 2016: Committee Stage (9 Nov 2016)
Richard Boyd Barrett: I would like to see the study.