The homeless figures: make grim reading with no progress made in terms of stemming the flow of families presenting as homeless or moving people out of emergency accommodation into long term housing. Consistent increases in the overall homelessness numbers over the past five years despite regular announcements of plans and strategies have destroyed confidence in the ability of the political system to deliver. Those are not my words. Those are the Minister's words in 2018. It is not the case that more than 40% of peo…

The Minister is misleading the House and he will have to correct the record.

You should not be allowed mislead the House, Minister.

Stick to the question. What is the Minister going to do about record homelessness?

What are you going to do about record homelessness? This is not a laughing matter, Minister.

Smirking at such an important issue.

Apologies, Chair.

Is the Minister in a position yet to tell us about the final delivery of social new build and affordable housing under the three affordable housing schemes for last year? If not, can he indicate if he believes the targets set out in his housing plan will be met on those four crucial schemes?

In fact the figures for delivery under the genuine affordable housing schemes are much worse than the number the Minister quoted here. In his first year as Minister, no affordable purchase homes were delivered and only 65 cost-rental homes. In 2022, there were only 323 genuinely affordable homes to purchase delivered and just under 700 cost-rental homes. The Minister is right that we do not have the full data yet and I look forward to seeing it but by the end of the third quarter, there were only 159 affordable pur…

The problem is that the Minister keeps missing his target. For example, he did not meet his affordable purchase or cost-rental targets last year. He will not meet them this year. On the first homes scheme, which the Minister is correct that I oppose, the Minister missed his targets by 50% last year and by even more the year before. But also, increasingly the homes he is talking about are not affordable. I have the details of affordable housing fund purchases in my constituency. The full price after the shared equit…

It is paid back in the end.

Either by their children, as a penalty, or when they sell. They pay the full price.

And very unaffordable.

I understand that 79 applications have been received by the Department for the interim remediation scheme for apartment and duplex owners with Celtic tiger-era defects across 22 counties, representing almost 7,500 residential units. Will the Minister provide an update on where those application are at and when he expects owner management companies, OMCs, to be able to draw down the funding? Will he also provide an update on when he expects the general scheme of the legislation underpinning the full redress scheme w…

I thank the Minister. With respect to fire safety, I would be interested to know if, even at this stage, he has an indication of how much expenditure is likely to be required for the applications and specifically when people will be able to draw down the money. I welcome the fact that decisions will be made soon. Regarding the legislation, does the Minister envisage an end-to-end scheme such as the pyrite remediation scheme in Leinster or a grant scheme similar to that for defective concrete blocks? I welcome what …

I thank the Minister for the clarification with respect to duplexes. There are schemes, such as Millford Manor in Kildare, where the houses had the same defects as the apartments and there was a very serious fire. I ask the Minister to look at that in the context of the legislation. Has the Minister made up his mind yet on whether this will be an end-to-end scheme similar to the pyrite mediation scheme or a grant scheme? Given the complexity of multi-unit developments, I strongly recommend an end-to-end scheme. Wit…

They are here to learn how not to do things.

This month the Land Development Agency announced its latest cost-rental homes. These include one-bedroom, two-bedroom and three-bedroom apartments in Citywest here in Dublin. The rents range from almost €1,400 a month for a one-bedroom apartment to €1,800 a month for a three-bedroom one. Under the rules of the cost-rental scheme, prospective tenants would need a gross income of €75,000 to access the one-bed and as high as €100,000 to access the three-bed. This means the thousands of people who earn too much to be e…

Are these rents affordable?

Are they affordable, yes or no?