Paudie Coffey (Waterford, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I appreciate the point the Senator makes. It probably is a matter for a wider debate. My Department, the Minister, Deputy Kelly, and I have regular engagements with the approved housing body associations. We have a monthly social housing strategy oversight meeting when we bring all the stakeholders together, including those bodies, the local authorities, Department officials and the Housing Agency. Those meetings are directly chaired by either the Minister, Deputy Kelly, or me, during which we monitor progress on the social housing strategy. That is ongoing and will continue. On the private housing side, unless we address the whole housing output and supply issues, affordability, rent and everything else are affected.That is where the determination is the moment. It is interesting to note some statistics from planning applications. The figures for the first quarter of this year are up 30% on the same period last year. There are substantial projects in the pipeline that we expect to see coming to fruition in the coming period. It is important to note that if the economic recovery had not taken hold, we would not be seeing this type of activity. When this Government came to office we were literally fighting a rising tide with one hand behind our backs, essentially trying to stabilise the economy and the public finances in the first instance. Thankfully, we managed to do that under difficult circumstances. We were able to bring ourselves to a position in which we can now start reinvesting in critical infrastructure such as housing. The fruits of that will be seen.

We have seen the negative effects of the crisis and the recession. Housing is one of the areas that has been affected, because construction was literally wiped out, as I said earlier. Unfortunately, because of the time lags with construction-related projects and the time involved, it is a slow process and not something one can simply throw money at and improve overnight. There are often planning and infrastructural issues as well as staffing issues in local authorities. Local authorities had to be resourced again because, to be fair, they had been denuded. More than 350 staff have been allocated by my Department to various planning and housing authorities throughout the country in order that they can meet the rising demand.

Section 34 is being opposed but we are against that. Obviously, we want to see the section included. The question of providing local authorities with the power to enter into long-term leasing and rental arrangements is critical. It is critical that we do not exclude this mechanism for addressing the housing challenge that exists. We need to have available all flexible options to local authorities and approved housing bodies. To remove any one of these would remove access to further housing and for that reason we are in favour of the section.