Aideen Hayden (Labour) | Oireachtas source

On a positive note, I notice that residential property transactions were up by 14% in the first quarter of 2013. As the Leader knows, I have a particular interest in housing. What is interesting is that the number of loans issued fell by 19% and that the market is effectively being taken over by cash buyers at a cost to first-time house buyers. We are also seeing rents rise. What we are seeing - dare I say it - is a repeat of what happened in the middle of the 1990s. Will the Leader arrange for the Minister for the Environment, Community and Local Government to come to the House for a discussion on the issue of the potential crisis in housing?

I raise the issue of the National Maternity Hospital and its recently announced relocation to the St. Vincent's Hospital campus. This is in line with international best practice in the area of maternal care and it was raised a number of times at the Oireachtas Joint Committee on Health and Children hearings on the heads of the protection of life during pregnancy Bill 2013. I would like to bring a salient point to the Leader's attention. The entire cost of this move will be in the region of €150 million. As there are 10,000 births per year in the hospital, in one year, it equates to €15,000 for each child born, in ten years, €1,500 and in 20 years, €700. That is excluding all the other procedures which will take place in this maternity hospital. It beggars belief that those opposite allowed this situation to continue for more than 20 years.