Finance Bill 2025 [Certified Money Bill]: Committee Stage
Seanad Éireann — 2025-12-09
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Cathal Byrne (FG), Cultural and Educational Panel

Fine Gael will support this section. I reiterate some of the points made earlier in the debate around the fact that the State cannot provide all houses, housing developments or apartments that are needed by hard-working first-time buyers, people who are seeking to buy their first starter home, or those who are seeking to move on from their starter home to their forever home. I challenge Sinn Féin to explain how it would go about bridging the viability gap here because the reality is that the private sector has an important role to play in our housing market. Small, medium and large builders are required in order to deliver on the Government's housing targets. It is to recognise the fact there is a very important role for first-time buyers and people in the private sector to purchase those houses.
As I said, I fully support local authorities and the Land Development Agency building on publicly owned land. There is a very important role for them in that. Indeed, they should be moving faster on that, but I recognise the fact we have a private sector in our housing area. It is very important that supports are delivered to ensure viability for builders in order to build much-needed houses.

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