Marie Louise O'Donnell (Independent)

The Minister of State is aware of the myriad of problems befalling us in respect of housing estates. I welcome him to the House. This is an interesting House. It is so beautiful, so qualitative, so historic and so magnificent in architecture, which makes it even more poignant considering the subject of our discussion. Some of these housing estates were built without heeding the fact that human beings would live in them. Some of these unfinished housing estates must be the greatest ugliness to befall our towns and heartlands. It never ceases to baffle me how this ugliness receives planning permission, leaving aside the actual architectural construction. I congratulate the Minister of State on his initiative in this regard. Every time I drive home to County Mayo, I am ashamed about what was allowed to happen because of greed in the guise of tax incentives. If it was not tax incentives, the previous Government was even more reprehensible and lacking in foresight.

Many of the reports on these sites refer to securing the sites but does securing sites and their ugliness aid and abet putting the real problem on a long finger? In other words, if we make them safe, the job is three quarters done and we can abandon them. What is the timeframe for the national co-ordination committee in the progression of the resolution? What will we do if developers and site owners who have abandoned their properties do not take on primary responsibility for addressing the difficulties? Have the developers and site owners been given a timeframe to respond adequately?

Missing from the report, Resolving Ireland's Unfinished Housing Developments, was a creative attempt at a solution. It addressed issues such as containment, safety and co-ordination of the various interests concerned but there was little on what could be done with the developments afterwards. Perhaps an open competition could be organised along the lines of Your Country, Your Call to come up with creative uses in the future. We could take a giant creative leap in this regard.

How many houses does the Minister of State intend to bulldoze? If I had a bulldozer I would be on the motorway to begin demolishing them.