Deputy Kelly asked No. 11. Deputy Boyd Barrett asked No. 12-----

What I have here is Deputies Kelly, Boyd Barrett, Bríd Smith, Paul Murphy and Barry.

Deputy Kelly raised the issue of the national maternity hospital, as have all the Deputies who spoke subsequently. Religious ethos will not influence the policy or activities of the hospital. I supported the repeal of the eighth amendment and the national maternity hospital will not be in any shape or form influenced by any religion. I have not discussed it with any bishop or archbishop. I do not think it is appropriate. Nor did they seek to discuss it with me at any stage. This Government is ten months old but thi…

Once the agreement and the discussions are complete, I would expect full accountability to the House in that respect.

As I said, this has gone on for quite a long time. Covid has dominated, but when we get full clarity around that, we will revert to the House on it. The Oireachtas health committee is an appropriate forum for the ins and outs of this project to be debated. We need to get a new national maternity hospital built.

The Rotunda is to follow. I have always found it extraordinary the length of time it has taken to argue these issues out and get them resolved given the State investment in all of these sites.

The State has invested hugely on the St. Vincent's site.

We should not be having these long-running sagas in terms of ownership and all the rest of it.

A week ago, Mrs. Justice Siobhan Keegan delivered her findings on the inquest into the deaths of ten people in Ballymurphy. The road to that moment had been a long and arduous one, but at its end was a profound and historic truth. Each of the ten was innocent. Each was unarmed. Every rumour or allegation about the victims being anything other than ordinary, decent private citizens was powerfully and categorically dismissed. The ten people who lost their lives in August 1971 were innocent victims, civilians, communi…

I led Fianna Fáil back into government to deal with substantive issues such as housing and to make it a key priority issue because of the needs of people in society for housing as a fundamental right and a basic entitlement. That is why we have spared no effort to comprehensively develop a range of initiatives and funding allocations to match those initiatives to get more houses built. Sinn Féin's motion this evening will not build one extra house. The Deputy should be honest about it. It would be far better if the…

The Deputy has seen action. Some €3.3 billion was allocated this year for house construction. The largest social housing programme is under way, as are affordable housing initiatives. The biggest actor in the housing market now is this Government

There is no question about that. That is the objective reality in terms of the allocation of funding to a variety of mechanisms, schemes and initiatives. The Government is providing the substantial funding for house construction. We need more than that. That is point I am making, to which the Deputy has not really responded. She does not see a role at all for the private sector and smaller and medium-sized builders, good, bad or indifferent. The Deputy does not seem to think they have any role, or that housing esta…

When it comes to it, there is no sense of urgency. I have listed some of the projects which Sinn Féin has opposed. If the Deputy were honest about this, she would say, as I am saying to people on my side-----

The crisis is now of such a state-----

-----that one does not have the luxury of continuing to oppose serious housing projects which are shovel ready.

However, Sinn Féin continues to oppose them and is giving no rational explanation as to why. It is serial objection at this stage.

What we have now in housing policy is an interventionist approach in terms of the State's role in social housing and the Minister's affordability legislation. These provide for a range of schemes where the State is getting directly involved in building affordable housing, not just social housing. It is through a range of supports, either through the serviced sites fund, the shared equity scheme or others, that the State is actually intervening to provide. The cost-rental scheme is there too which, again, is State i…

There is a project developing in Cork on the Boherboy Road, from which the Deputy will get a strong sense of what that affordability is in terms of the range of prices, which are really affordable. The Government is ten months in office. Without question, it has taken a significant interventionist approach in the provision of housing, both social and affordable, along with the necessary accompanying infrastructure to deal with it. The preference is direct build. The Minister made announcements and set targets aroun…

The Deputy has deliberately ignored the substance of the Government's intervention in the housing market. We are on the cusp of the largest social housing building programme, through the allocation of substantial funding on unprecedented scale. That is a reality. The issue will be delivery and getting those houses built through the local authorities. The authorities must start commissioning builders to get those housing estates built on the social housing front. In the context of affordability, a range of initiativ…

-----it will need initiatives around affordable housing-----