Larry Butler (Fianna Fail)

The Minister has given an extra €1.7 billion to deal with the housing problem. While I want to be fair to Fine Gael and Labour representatives in the councils, it is taking far too long for local authorities to get schemes up and running. It takes six months to bring a Part 8 application to the council where it remains for another three months. My colleague, Senator Regan, will agree that many schemes came to the council in an 18-month to two-year period but they did not deliver any housing in that time. This is a problem. We must have a full debate on this and I ask the Leader to allocate time for it.

The budget also addressed green issues. These are serious issues.