Derelict Sites
Dail Éireann — 2025-12-09
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Simon Harris (FG), Wicklow

I genuinely am eager to engage on the design and construct of the new tax and we will have an opportunity to do that through the legislative process. I do also genuinely take the point around the urgency of this, and the Government genuinely does too, but we also have to just make sure we get it right. I am conscious there are local authorities around the country that do very a good job and that are also very busy. This is quite an important and big project for them because we have to have a consistency in terms of this. It cannot be a case of County Wicklow doing one thing in relation to a derelict site levy and County Louth doing another. That is a levy collected by the local authorities. Once this becomes a national tax there has to be that consistent approach.
I agree with the Deputy about dereliction and the housing emergency, absolutely, but dereliction more broadly is a real issue. We will get to some of this later as well, but this is why we have made some changes, for example with the living cities initiatives and the like to try and bring derelict properties back into use, particularly on main streets with over-the-shop schemes as well.

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Record URI: https://data.oireachtas.ie/akn/ie/debateRecord/dail/2025-12-09/debate/main
Retrieved: 2026-08-14T04:54:26+00:00
Sitting date: 2025-12-09