Cabinet Committees
Dail Éireann — 2026-06-09
============================================================

Micheál Martin (FF), Cork South-Central

Okay. It is good to see. He outlined that close to 1,000 houses have been built and now there is a further proposal for 600 houses. There is a lot happening on the housing front. We just need more and more of it and to keep the momentum going.
Deputy O'Meara asked about one-off rural housing. I accept the basic principle that on your own land or in your own community we need people to have the capacity to regenerate that community, to grow up in it, to support the clubs, to maintain a population critical mass and to keep heritage and a community vibrant. The Minister, Deputy Browne, and the Minister of State, Deputy Cummins, are close to new rural housing guidelines. We have discussed this. We are looking at the Gaeltacht as well. Hopefully, within the next number of weeks, we will have clarity on that and those guidelines will be brought to Cabinet.
In response to Deputy Cleere, I pay tribute to Eamon Langton as well. It is a wonderful tribute and he has joined an elite group of people. Fair play to the mayor, Councillor Coonan for his initiative in this regard. I have enjoyed their hospitality from time to time as well in the past while in Kilkenny. I note that Brian Cody was among the recipients as well. He is a good man to give a pep talk to any group of people, be they hurling or political. I do not know the man's politics at all but he is a man who speaks a lot of sense. On the rural housing guidelines, similar to Deputy O'Meara, Deputy Cleere has been championing that and arguing for it. I hope we will have the guidelines in the next fortnight or so.
In response to Deputy Boyd Barrett, I do not think I have the full story from him. I probably have the story from his perspective but I would be interested to know if it will definitely go for housing. A thousand houses will be built there.

---

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/2026-06-09/debate/main
Retrieved: 2026-09-14T01:01:05+00:00
Sitting date: 2026-06-09