Derelict Sites (Amendment) Bill 2022: Second Stage [Private Members] Dail Éireann — 2026-01-15 ============================================================ Thomas Gould (SF), Cork North-Central I thank my staff, especially my PA, who have done a tremendous amount of work on this legislation. I also thank the Office of Parliamentary Legal Advisers, OPLA, which has assisted me in bringing in this legislation. The Minister might criticise it but it is right and has gone through the whole process. As a back bench TD, I am limited in the legislation I can bring forward. I would love to go much further. I would love to work with the Minister on it but he comes in here and criticises the proposals I have made. He just said he was having a war on dereliction. What he did not say was it was not starting for another two years. He comes in here and criticises local authorities and councils but he has given local authorities the job of pulling the derelict sites register together. They have had that job for 35 years. The Minister is telling me they could not get it right for 35 years and is blaming them for not collecting the levy, but he is still leaving them in charge of putting the list together. The Minister cannot run with the hare and hunt with the hounds. I spoke earlier about being in the Mercy hospital on Tuesday night, a freezing cold night. It was jammed out the door, with trolleys everywhere. I was 11 hours in there with a family member. People told me they came into A and E to get out of the cold. I do not know whether the Minister knows where the Mercy hospital is in Cork. Within minutes' walking distance of the hospital are derelict buildings. Around the corner from the hospital are buildings that are rotting. The Minister should be bringing in this legislation now. I know that when his Bill is enacted, my Bill will fall, but at least until the Minister's Bill comes in, this Bill will be working away. The Minister commented twice but he never once mentioned the €20 million owed by speculators to whom he is giving an amnesty. Those are the facts. He also never discussed why the 2024 figures on dereliction have not been released. They are normally released every March. The Minister is hiding the figures. I got them from every other Minister but I cannot get them off Deputy Browne. Why is he hiding and covering up the dereliction and the landholders and speculators who have derelict sites all over the State? The Minister says he wants a war on dereliction. Give us the figures. Release them. Why will the Minister not release them? It is because they will show how bad things are. Other Members have made comments about different towns and cities. Does the Minister know how hard it is for people living in overcrowded accommodation with two or three generations in the one house when there is a derelict site around the corner? Does he know how hard it is for people in emergency accommodation to bring their children across the city to school, passing a dozen properties that could be their home? The Minister talks about his Government. Why is he not doing this now? He should be tackling dereliction today. This Government has been in place for more than a year. Why is it not doing its job? It is because Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael are up to their tonsils in vested interests, the landholders and speculators who are only interested in making money. If the Minister wants us to take him at face value, he needs to tackle this now. People want action. They do not want the Minister to be talking about this next year or the year after. They want action now. People are leaving this country to go to Australia because they cannot find somewhere to rent. There are people leaving because they cannot find a house to buy. There are people who are stuck because they cannot get social housing but cannot afford rent. I am not sure about the Minister's pride in his responsibility. I am genuinely not trying to insult him but these are the facts as we stand in the Dáil today. We have the highest rents, the highest house prices and the highest homelessness figures in the history of the State and Deputy Browne is the Minister. He can blame us in the Opposition but I am trying to fix something. This Bill will not fix everything but it would be a start. It would send a message to those the Minister has called criminals, those involved in the antisocial behaviour of destroying communities through dereliction. It would send a message that this will not be tolerated any more. It would also send a message to people who are struggling and who are looking for a light at the end of the tunnel. It would tell them that this Government will do something. This Government has done nothing on dereliction for 35 years. Does the Minister know the joke about this? Does he know who brought in the original dereliction legislation? In 1990, Charles Haughey was the Taoiseach and Pádraig Flynn was the Minister. Those two individuals thought it was bad 35 years ago. Governments have done nothing for 35 years. Charles Haughey, the former Taoiseach, owned an island. Those two men knew back then that this was wrong. I am here today trying to work with the Government but it will not work with us. It will not work with the Opposition and it definitely will not work with Sinn Féin. We propose having Revenue collect this levy. That should have started on 1 January. The Minister could give local authorities funding and staff to compulsorily purchase buildings. He could give local authorities support to take on the developers who are sitting on these sites and not developing them. There are people out there who want to buy these properties to turn them into businesses, homes, community centres and sports facilities but the Minister is letting them rot. There are buildings rotting in this country. Who is responsible? Who is going to do anything about it? Deputy Browne is the Minister. We could walk out the door here and see building after building that is derelict but the Minister is coming in here and asking us to wait until 2027, when we might get to it. With no disrespect, I do not believe the Government will get to it in 2027. Enough is enough. The Minister said he was not going to tolerate this but what is he doing? He can make these statements but the proof is in the pudding. The proof is in his actions and his actions are not delivering. This Government, the Taoiseach, the Tánaiste and the Minister have brass necks to tell us they are going to solve the housing crisis and the homelessness crisis and that they are going to stop people emigrating because they need homes. I know people who have left. Does the Minister know what they are hoping for? They are hoping there is going to be another financial crash here so they can come home and buy a house. They are telling me they will never be able to come home with the price of houses and rents here and that their only hope is another financial crash. They do not believe the Government is interested in them. They do not believe it wants to support them. Every day, I talk to genuine hardworking people who are trying to build lives for themselves and their families. All they are looking for is a safe and affordable home so they can live their lives. Is that too much to ask? Over the last few days, I have been listening to different Ministers talking about all the people who are working and how well the country is going. For a lot of people, it is going well. However, if you do not have a house, a home and a roof over your head and your children's heads to call your home, where are you going? Where is this Government going? It is not good enough. I brought forward legislation to work with the Government. I would have amended it. We could have amended it down the road. We could all have worked together. We still can because the vote on this is not until next Wednesday night. I ask the Minister to think about it. Perhaps he could pull the Opposition together with his own backbenchers. Those backbenchers are telling him the same. We could still work together and make a difference. At the end of the day, it is about helping people and providing housing for people to make a difference. It is about stopping dereliction and the speculators. --- Source: Houses of the Oireachtas. Licensed under CC BY 4.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/). The Official Report is revised after first publication; the fetch timestamp below identifies the version quoted. Record URI: https://data.oireachtas.ie/akn/ie/debateRecord/dail/2026-01-15/debate/main Retrieved: 2026-08-14T04:54:30+00:00 Sitting date: 2026-01-15