If the Minister of State does not concede that the scheme is a failure, would he at least accept that it is not producing results at the speed originally intended by Government? In particular, would he accept that a national scheme designed to alleviate a massive housing need cannot be shaping up to its requirement when it produces a mere 181 completed transactions?
Given the figures quoted earlier by Deputy Dukes, would the Minister accept, particularly in relation to the Dublin region where more than 90 per cent of the tenants who would be considered under the scheme are excluded because of income levels, because they are in receipt of social welfare payments or on an income level at which they could never qualify because of house prices in Dublin, that there is a need to build some variation into the scheme, if it is to work, to have consideration for the prices of houses in these areas. I understand that other areas in the country, such as Galway, have similar difficulties and where the national income at social welfare level is fixed the scheme cannot operate effectively because of the very high price of houses in urban areas.