Deputy Durkan was in possession and he has 20 minutes remaining.
Housing (Miscellaneous Provisions) (No. 2) Bill, 2001: Second Stage (Resumed).
Question again proposed: "That the Bill be now read a Second Time."
I do not know why this legislation has come before us. If ever a Bill was likely not to have an impact on the issue facing us, this is it. If we brought in a Bill for the Minister to give emergency directions to local authorities throughout the country to build houses I would welcome it. If the Minister introduced a Bill to issue directions to local authorities to ensure there was adequate, affordable housing available to the population I would welcome it. The amazing factor about this legislation is that it is essentially cosmetic legislation. It is coming before the House, allegedly to deal with an issue, but it does not deal with the issue and is five years too late.
I cannot understand how nobody in the Department of the Environment and Local Government has mentioned the seriousness of our housing situation. The major contribution made by the Government over the past four and a half years has been to count the numbers twice and come up with a revised number of those on waiting lists. There are about 120,000 families in the country seeking first time housing. In my constituency there are about 3,500. About 2,700 of those are on the local authority waiting list and another 1,000 or more are people with an income but that income is not sufficient to purchase a house.
The maximum loan available under the local authority loan system is approximately €130,000 but no house is for sale at that price. The question of affordable housing is a farce and this legislation does nothing to address the issue. I feel embarrassed when I meet constituents who were in need of a house five years ago and who still need a house but have less prospect of getting one now. Ten years ago such people would have been living in mobile homes or caravans all over the countryside. Unless something dramatic is done, other than what is proposed in this legislation, half of our population will be living in mobile homes or caravans and be in danger from living in unsafe and unhealthy conditions.
I read the Minister's speech carefully looking for some inspiration or some indication of hope for my constituents. The normal criteria for obtaining a building society loan has been that an applicant can get a maximum loan of two and a half times a gross income. The price of housing has long since passed that by. Housing prices were driven sky high and coupled with a shortage of housing the result is that housing is now a luxury. Even the promise of a house is now a luxury.
There was a time when we could inform constituents that if they had a job they could aspire to a home of their own within six months. That time is long gone. Housing is now a luxury and we have had situations where people left the country because they did not have a home. We now have the situation where people pay £100 a week for the smallest accommodation and we have up to 14 people sharing a house. The Minister has brought in various regulations to address the issue but nothing has been achieved because there are insufficient housing units to meet the need.
It is an appalling situation. I know the Minister of State, Deputy Dan Wallace, is a kind, caring and compassionate man but unless there is something dramatic done soon, other than what we have seen before or other than what is proposed in this legislation, the consequences will be disastrous.
It is all very well to say there has been a slowdown in housing costing €400,000 or €500,000. That may be of concern to housing market people or people who paid such high prices but it is of no relevance to the people with reasonably good jobs who just a few years ago were regarded as middle-income groups. For what are the sons and daughters of the present generation waiting? Will they wait until house prices drop below the €130,000 mark? There is no chance of that. I reject everything contained in the proposal before us because it fails to address the biggest issue facing this country since I was elected to this House.
The Bill does other peculiar things. It proposes a clawback for those with shared ownership loans. God love those unfortunate people who, having squeezed themselves into a situation where they could obtain a shared ownership loan to possibly buy a house, will now have that extra clawback nugget at their elbow which makes sure that they are properly penalised for daring to apply for such a loan. They will have to pay part of it back if they sell their house within 20 years. That is the craziest situation I have ever come across and I have serious doubts as to its legality. There will be situations where a person will have to move for job purposes and have a genuine reason for moving. I do not see anything in the Bill which suggests that compassionate consideration can be given in such circumstances and presume it will not be. The concept of clawback was rightly abolished years ago because it was deemed to be unfair.
The Minister came up with some interesting quotes. I would love to have been at his scriptwriter's elbow when the speech was prepared. When he spoke about the affordable housing scheme, which was supposed to be the panacea to resolve the housing crisis, the Minister said the indications were that last year a total of 300 units were completed under the scheme and that 6,270 were under construction or planned. The planning part is the aspect for which I take my hat off to the Department. There are plans in my constituency for houses that will be lucky to appear on the scene in the next two years. Some may never appear.
What was the Department doing for the last five years? Why did it not produce these houses five years ago? What is to happen to those who have been on the waiting list for affordable housing or local authority houses? Where will they go? Somebody, somewhere will have to take responsibility for this and tell people the situation as is. There is no sense in having a situation, similar to that concerning the emperor's clothes, where the Minister comes into the House with a proposal that he says will solve the housing problem as if there had not been a problem up to now. I have had questions answered by the Minister in the House over the past four years indicating that there was no housing problem or crisis. He suggested that there was no shortage of housing. If the body responsible, the Department of the Environment and Local Government, is not aware of the seriousness of the housing problem, there is no help for anyone. That is where the solution is supposed to start.
The Minister says other things. The word "affordable" should be deleted from his vocabulary at this stage. There is no affordable house, in my constituency or elsewhere, available to those families with a single income of less than €50,000. There is not, and will not be, anything available for them and the provisions of this legislation will do nothing for them. The Minister also said social housing programmes remain the primary vehicle for providing access to accommodation for lower income households. That used to be the case, but how is access to this elusive housing provision determined when so few houses are being provided? I know that the Department will state there has been a huge increase over 1988 or 1999. However, a huge increase from nothing is nothing. That is the bottom line.
There is also the question of access for lower income groups. For example, a family may be renting accommodation that costs up to €1,400 at present. It can be expected to have an income of perhaps €50,000 per annum, which is not a bad income, even though it might include two combined salaries, yet it may not be able to get out of rental accommodation and its housing needs have not been met nor are they likely to be met.
Under existing housing legislation, it is the duty of the Department to ensure a person has his or her housing needs met. One of the proposals under the European Charter of Human Rights, at one stage, was that every person would have the right to a home of his or her own, although it was opposed by the Irish Government of the day. If adopted, it would have caused consternation in Ireland, but it was not. However, I believe that every person has the right to a home of his or her own. The sooner we recognise this, on all sides of the House and particularly in the Department of the Environment and Local Government, the better.
This is not by way of criticism of individuals, but unless, in the shortest possible time, some recognition is given to the seriousness of the housing situation, there will have to be emigration to relieve the shortage. That is my appraisal. I hope that even at this late stage the Minister and his Department will come forward with something tangible and realisable in a reasonable time. They should cut out this nonsense of massaging the number on the housing lists, the nonsense of reviewing the number on the housing lists, the nonsense of telling people to apply every time they change address despite being forced to change address on a regular basis, and the excessive administration costs associated with this nonsense. The Department should issue a directive to the various local authorities to ensure they provide, or cause to be provided, sufficient means for those currently outside the housing system in order that they can achieve their target.
While I may be getting close to my time limit, I know that the Leas-Cheann Comhairle will tell me if that is so.
The Deputy has five minutes remaining.
Excellent, one can do a lot of damage in five minutes. However, it would take five hours to set out fully the litany of atrocities perpetrated on hapless members of the public looking to own houses of their own.
There is another fundamental matter. I can remember, when I was a lot younger, going down the promenade at Dún Laoghaire. Written on the wall were the words, "vote Fianna Fáil; the party that made meat a luxury." I do not know when that will be written again or who will write it. However, I hope the same scribe does not come back and append the words, "the same party that made housing a luxury" because that is now what housing is. The right to have a home of one's own is a luxury at this time. No one should have any illusions about this.
There has been a suggestion in certain quarters that the people are old-fashioned in our aspiration to own our own homes, that we should be more cosmopolitan like other Europeans and lease or rent our homes, and that we should be be damn glad to get a home.
Maybe that is true but let us remember there was a long, hard and bitter struggle in this country for people to have the right to own their own home. If we lose sight of that, we will lose something which, although it may not be very inspiring for the people stuck on the list at present, was sufficient to inspire those who laid the foundations of this State. We would do well to remember that. We are not like the rest of Europe; we do not lease our houses. We have the right to aspire to own our houses. I totally reject the notion that we should go where we are sent by those who think they know better than we do. This pattern is beginning to emerge in the thinking of the Department of the Environment and Local Government.
We hear a great deal of nonsense about spatial strategy and where people should live in the future. Where should they live now? Why does the Department not tell the people where they should live now? Surely, there must be somebody with that kind of resourcefulness in the Department. We know it is more economical to house people in certain ways. In some parts of the country, the practice is to build two houses – one on top of the other. There is a particular name to describe that but, essentially, it is one house built on top of another because we have run out of space. If, like Holland, we had run out of space by virtue of an increase in population, we would have a population of over 50 million. The so-called experts who tell us we have run out of ground and should do things differently should cop themselves on. We are not all fools and we have heard it and seen it all before. The island of Ireland is approximately one third the size of the United Kingdom, the population of which is 13 times greater than ours. We have a long way to go.
Before some expert from the Department of the Environment and Local Government or somewhere else tells me it is much more econ omical to house people in conurbations close to railway tracks and adjacent to motorways where there is ready access and transport, all of which is quite true, he should consider the likely social cost of this economics? Has anybody ever asked what happened in other countries and why we had to change our housing policy in certain parts of this city as a result of economic decisions taken in the past? Has anybody considered what the verdict of the people will be if, at some stage in the future, somebody asks whether we built one house on top of another because we were running out of space?
The Deputy is running out of time.
Not for the first time in my life, a Cheann Comhairle, and I hope not for the last.
The proposal before us is a farce. It is a piece of cosmetics which attempts to dress up a situation in respect of which a crisis has existed for at least the past four years. Nothing has been done to address the lack of affordable housing to a large proportion of our population.
With the permission of the House, I wish to share my time with Deputy Clune.
It is nearly two years since I was our party's spokesperson on housing. I have kept a close eye on the development of policy from the Government benches during the two years since I left that portfolio but the situation has not improved. The situation, as Deputy Durkan quite rightly said, is getting worse, not better. It is strange that what is, in effect, quite minor legislation is coming before the House in the dying days of this Government when much more important legislation, which was promised and which was the subject of a very important commission that reported over two years ago, has yet to come before the House. I refer to legislation on the private rented sector. It is astonishing that the Government established a commission which had a timeframe of six months to report and bring forward conclusions, but a year and a half since the publication of its report on the private rented sector, we have not seen any action. We have still not seen legislation which would give some protection to tenants.
I do not know what the Government is playing at but it is interesting to note that even at this time, the Government benches cannot produce speakers, so ashamed are they of the Government's record on housing policy. That is because over the past number of years, the Government has relied on a series of high profile productions by Dr. Peter Bacon, all of which have been contradicted by the Government's response. I make one point which highlights this.
On the issue of speculators, the Finance (No. 2) Bill, 1998, took out of the equation those people who were coming into the housing market to buy up property and rent it out. They were described by the Minister, Deputy Dempsey, as speculators. Following a report by Dr. Bacon, those people were removed from the equation and, only six months ago, the Minister again referred to this group of people and said they could never again be catered for. What we rightly saw in the recent budget was a complete reversal of policy. There is no consistency from the Government on this issue. The Government has cut through Dr. Bacon's reports and there is no confidence in relation to the issue of affordable housing. The longer the Government goes on, the more it and its supporters realise that this is one of the key areas in which they will be exposed in the upcoming election.
In excess of 5,000 people are homeless or living rough on the streets of this capital and of our towns and cities. It has recently been brought to my attention that one can only be defined by the health boards as a homeless person if one has resided for at least three months in a hostel in any of the health board areas. This is an astonishing situation. The Government is massaging the figures because one cannot be classified as a homeless person unless one fulfils certain criteria. Of course, the figures on which the Government relies to indicate the number of people who are homeless are completely inaccurate because the majority of homeless people cannot get a hostel place. This is one of the coldest days we have experienced this year and the situation will get worse later in February and in March. It is an absolute scandal that in this day and age, in excess of 5,000 of our fellow citizens cannot be housed in either temporary or permanent accommodation. This is one of the greatest flaws in the housing policy pursued by this Government. Despite the high profile announcement by the Taoiseach some months ago, in excess of 5,000 people are homeless tonight. There is no chance that these people will be housed by any of the health boards in question.
The Government regularly lectures us about the total number of new starts and, admittedly, new starts in the area of social housing are impressive. However, there is a fundamental distinction between new starts and the number of completions at the end of a given year. While the Government has expectations that the local authority housing programme can deliver a certain number of houses in a given year, we all know they have manifestly shown themselves unable to deliver on their targets, minimal as they are, year in and year out.
This legislation, in effect, extends the borrowing capacity of the housing finance agency by a significant amount so that loans can be made to local authorities. It makes a mockery of local government that significant sums of money in the capital accounts of many local authorities cannot be used for the purposes of housing because they do not have the Government's permission to use it. My own local authority is asset and capital rich to the tune of over €20 million. As a local authority we cannot at any given time divert a signifi cant tranche of that money for the purpose of house building programmes. We have a totally centralised structure when it comes to housing provision and providing capital for the purposes of providing affordable housing in all local authority areas. It is ridiculous that local authorities cannot spend the money they have but must seek the approval of a central committee in the Custom House before they can vary the amount they spend on various programmes. It underlines the complete inadequacy of local government that moneys in the capital accounts of various local authorities cannot be used for the purpose the members want because the Government has not given them permission for that purpose.
I strongly support the affordable housing scheme, which is good. If properly used it will make a difference to a significant number of people who are trying to get into the housing market. The initial proposal came from the Minister of State, Deputy Molloy, in 1999. I remember the memorandum he circulated to local authorities. However, as Deputy Durkan said, last year only 600 housing units were completed throughout the country, which is minuscule. Up to 6,000 are planned for this year or are in the process of being completed. There seems to be no capacity for housing policy to deliver in local areas, and no capacity for the Department to ensure it sticks to the plans to which it has committed itself. This is a real problem in this area. Last year, three years on from the introduction of the scheme, 600 houses were built. This again underlines the failure of the Department to deliver on its commitments. Be that as it may, it is a good scheme. It has the capacity to significantly increase the housing output in local authorities. I once again call on local authorities to use their powers under this scheme and to use this legislation to significantly increase the number of housing units.
The income threshold for the shared ownership scheme, an excellent scheme which provides an opportunity for people to get on the housing ladder, needs to be looked at again. It is ridiculous that two-income families cannot afford to buy a house and that some of them are still priced out of the market by the income level for the shared ownership scheme. This income level needs to be monitored on a three or four monthly basis as against the two yearly assessment recommended in the Bacon report.
One area on which I want to concentrate, which is not part of the Bill but is part of the Housing (Miscellaneous Provisions) Act which regularly comes before the House, is the chronic shortage of good quality central heating systems in social housing provision throughout the country. The Minister of State at the Department of the Environment and Local Government, Deputy Wallace, whom I greatly admire, told me in the House before the Christmas recess that as many as 50,000 local authority homes are without an effective, affordable heating system. It is aston ishing in 2002 that such a significant number of local authority homes do not have central heating. I understand that a new assessment is taking place in the Department with all of the local authorities concerned. I readily admit that some local authorities are much better than others, but we need a national conversion programme over the next three to four years and to set out a very clear objective that every local authority house will be converted to some form of central heating system by 2006. I understand the cost would be about €200 million. It would be a good investment. It would make a big difference in cutting down on respiratory and other illnesses that many local authority tenants experience.
It is a scandal that local authority tenants must pay the full rent under the differential rent scheme when the quality of the house is pathetic compared to other houses in the local authority housing stock. A landlord renting a house to a tenant would expect to have to ensure that the house had a central heating system. However, we are renting 50,000 local authority homes without central heating to members of the general public and that issue has not been grasped by this Government. It is essentially an issue of poverty proofing. I cannot understand why the three Ministers in the Department have done nothing about this over the past five years. I call on the Government to concentrate on this issue, to put in place a national conversion programme and to do something significant for the many people who have inadequate heating at the time of the year when it is cold, wet and windy. We need to do something quickly for those people.
Every Deputy will have something to contribute on a Bill such as this, particularly those who are also a member of a local authority. The issue of housing is something which comes again and again. We deal on a daily basis with applicants for housing in our constituencies. Cork Corporation, of which I am a member, now has over 4,200 applicants on its housing list. That is serious because each of those applicants represents a family unit. The list increases every month because the number of people that are housed does not match the number of new applicants. The number of applicants on the housing list increased by about 18% last year and it is continuing to increase, which is alarming. It is also frustrating that the only way people looking for housing feel they can get themselves on the list and housed is to approach officials to push their case. It is a very serious situation. The Government has failed to deliver a housing programme to match the needs of our communities. Other Deputies have spoken on this already, but it is something we all feel very strongly about.
I would like to talk about shared ownership and affordable housing, although they are not mentioned specifically in the Bill. I have always been very supportive of those schemes which are very valuable. There is quite a gap between being a local authority tenant and owning one's own home. There are many people between those two extremes who could be helped. The most valuable thing the State could do in this area is to transfer some of its wealth to enable people to own their own houses. That is where shared ownership and affordable housing come in. There is another very valuable scheme whereby local authorities sell serviced sites at cost to people who can afford to build their own house. We need to expand on such schemes and help people to own their own houses. There are many people who want to own their own house but find the costs too exorbitant.
Deputy Hayes mentioned the income threshold for the shared ownership scheme. I ask the Minister to look at that again. It is becoming impossible to buy a house, particularly in the Cork area. Income certainly does not match the cost of housing. This needs to be addressed. Many people who find themselves in the middle ground should be supported and helped to own their own homes, particularly when the cost of private rented accommodation is so exorbitant that some people are paying £600 or £700. Such costs are an enormous burden on people, preventing them from getting on the housing ladder and buying their own house. They find it difficult to get the deposit for a mortgage but the irony is that they would pay less if they were servicing a mortgage than they pay to a private landlord.
Renting is money down the drain. We should introduce legislation to protect those in the private rented sector rather than a Housing (Miscellaneous Provisions) Bill. The Government set up a commission but we have yet to see legislation to enact its recommendations even though security of tenure and protection of tenants' rights are very important and necessary. I pay tribute to Threshold. Its role – giving advice, support and assistance to tenants and to those looking for housing, and intervening with landlords – is invaluable.
Economic success has resulted in house prices going through the roof. Young couples find it so difficult to afford their own homes that both have to work full-time to service the mortgage. Most young people can afford mortgages that are only 75% of the cost of a house, the balance comes from their parents or other family members. That is unsustainable. Why should parents who have reared their children be expected to support them as they try to purchase their own homes? It is, however, a fact of life today and families are struggling with it, even though many parents did not see themselves in such a situation.
Section 2 of Part 3 of the Bill specifies building regulations that provide for more efficient energy use, including renewable forms of energy. Much can be achieved through the regular supervision of construction work. Regulations exist and we know what we are supposed to do but builders are cutting corners because they know they will not be picked up on it. There should be greater supervision and enforcement. We must consider using renewable forms of energy in homes, such as solar panels or other innovative schemes.
I welcome the opportunity to speak on the Bill and to bring to the Chamber the frustrations so many people are experiencing. I was speaking to a separated mother of three last week who had to spend three nights with her children in a car because she was evicted when her rent was increased. Such situations exist across the State and they are a sad indictment of our society. More needs to be done to focus on those people.
I compliment the Minister on this legislation which gives statutory standing to social and affordable housing and tidies up some of the anomalies in current housing legislation. The success of the Government's building programme can be seen from the figures indicated by the Minister – more than 200,000 houses were built in the past five years. It highlights the demand for housing and the need for measures which will streamline the legislation and deal with some of the anomalies, while setting down a framework for the development of housing under the national development plan. It is difficult to know where to start with housing because so much is involved but this legislation gives us the opportunity to debate some of the issues.
Elderly people in isolated areas find that the conditions in which they live are far below the necessary standards. Previous speakers mentioned the provision of heating, a matter of vital importance to the elderly. In the west of my constituency, and in the west in general, there are large numbers of elderly people living in isolated houses which do not even have basic facilities such as running water or toilet and sewerage facilities, decent heating and, in many cases, adequate windows or doors.
The Western Health Board operates a very good housing scheme for the elderly where, with the minimum of bureaucracy, it interviewed the elderly living alone, identified their requirements, sought quotations for improvements and, at very small cost to the authorities, put in place adequate facilities for them, although large numbers still have to be dealt with.
People with disabilities face enormous difficulties. The red tape and delays involved in applications for small grants for extensions or refurbishments for people with disabilities are unreal. In my constituency there are people who have been waiting for three years for work as minor as the installation of a shower unit for a person in a wheelchair. It baffles me why it is necessary to get certification from medical officers and community nurses before these jobs can be done. These people are in receipt of benefits evaluated by the Department of Social, Community and Family Affairs and the health boards. Why are further assessments, which hold up their applications for a year or two, necessary?
The allocations are inadequate to meet the demand. Last year Clare County Council paid out in excess of £1 million in disability grants but it received a grant of less than £500,000. This year's allocation will pay for work completed last year. Now many people are on a waiting list and have been told to cut back on the development of their houses because there is not enough money to meet their demands. This is unacceptable. It did not happen today or yesterday, so the Opposition cannot make snide comments. It has been going on for years. It is necessary to streamline the legislation governing the payment of grants for essential repairs. Grants to the disabled and elderly are paid through health boards for minor remedial work to houses. This Bill aims to tidy up the many anomalies in housing, particularly those concerning shared ownership schemes, so this is the time to highlight the necessity for streamlining such grant payments. The requirements of people with disabilities, the elderly and pensioners generally need to be assessed. In addition, an overview of the relevant legislation should be undertaken in order to have an efficient system of dealing with such matters so that people will not be left waiting for two or three years for minor works, such as the installation of a shower unit, central heating or new windows.
Hear, hear.
I wish to place on record my appreciation of the work of some of the voluntary agencies in providing accommodation. I compliment in particular Respond, the housing agency that has been very successful in developing houses in Shannon, Ennis and other parts of County Clare, as well as other areas in the west. The schemes undertaken by Respond demonstrate a high level of professionalism, including excellent plans and specifications. I commend the fact that in many of its schemes, Respond also installs community facilities. Over the years there has been a lack of planning in this area as a result of which many housing schemes in smaller towns were left without adequate sports and leisure facilities, compared to those provided for larger estates. There have been successful developments in towns such as Kilrush where there is a mix of elderly and young families in housing estates, but no facilities were included for community meetings or recreational facilities for younger people. Young people in many such estates got into difficulties of one kind or another due to the absence of adequate social facilities. That criticism is timely because in the new drive to develop affordable social housing there is a necessity to provide complementary community facilities. A specialised approach to this issue must be adopted.
I also wish to record my appreciation of the substantial upgrading that has taken place in the provision of local authority housing generally. A few new schemes have been undertaken in County Clare and the engineers and council personnel are to be complimented on the style and quality of the new houses being constructed for local authorities. I presume the same applies in other counties. In Clare, we have had new housing schemes in Ennis, Kilrush and Miltown Mal bay as well as other smaller towns. The council has installed first-class housing which is a credit to the professionalism of the council staff and to the Department of the Environment and Local Government which supervised the work.
Most of the time, if a small amount of additional finance was provided to upgrade them we would not have the kind of dereliction we have seen in many housing schemes over the years. I can recall houses that were built in the 1940s and 1950s being allowed to fall into disrepair by the local authorities. In some cases they became totally dilapidated because, once they were completed, no attention or additional finance was provided for their upkeep. Therefore, the cost of upgrading such housing stock became enormous. In many cases, windows and doors had fallen out and the houses were in a shocking state. It was unreal to see what happened to once valuable housing stock. For want of minor investment such houses were allowed to fall into disrepair in the past, thus becoming unfit for human habitation. Such a situation needs to be avoided in future so that when the State invests heavily in housing development, whether through voluntary organisations or county councils, back-up funding for maintenance should be increased. Every local authority should have a maintenance section. We had such sections years ago but they were not continued and, as a result, many of the houses that were built at substantial cost to the Exchequer fell into disrepair and became unfit for use.
The Bill underpins the work being done by housing agencies and voluntary organisation such as Respond. There is a new awareness of the contribution that voluntary housing organisations can make to building up smaller towns and villages. I attended a meeting recently in Tulla, County Clare, where a modern, sophisticated housing scheme is being put in place by a voluntary organisation. The people involved are to be complimented on the work they are doing. Not only are they providing essential housing in isolated rural villages but they are also helping to halt the population decline in such areas. The Government must react to these developments by providing infrastructural investment for sewerage, water and other services so that small towns and villages can thrive.
The Bill is both timely and valuable. In examining the situation, however, the Minister should look further to see what needs to be done in the areas I have mentioned. The provision of reconstruction grants needs to be re-examined, including a new formula to streamline grants for essential repairs to housing for the elderly and the disabled. By providing the finances to enable that to be done we can provide people with an opportunity to live in decent housing. It is a small contribution for us to make.
I compliment the Minister and the Minister of State for introducing the Bill which represents a major advance. While the record of what has been achieved over the past five years is there to be seen, a huge challenge lies ahead. We can make a start today by tackling these issues and putting in place a framework which will enable the points that I have raised to be dealt with effectively over the next few years.
I wish to share time with Deputies Farrelly and Connaughton.
Is that agreed? Agreed.
I wish to deal with three main issues concerning the Bill: first, the crisis concerning applications for housing tenancy; second, housing aid for the elderly; and, third, housing repairs. There are currently 1,350 applicants on Limerick County Council's housing waiting list, but many of them will be waiting for years before they are housed. Many are young families living in overcrowded conditions and sub-standard accommodation. They are in urgent need of proper accommodation but cannot afford to buy houses due to low incomes and the fact that house prices have gone beyond their reach. In the immediate future they will not be in a position to consider purchasing private accommodation. This is putting pressure on families and, given that the Government is supposed to be so supportive of the family, it is a disgrace that such people must live in overcrowded conditions. In recent days, several families have contacted me about rodent infestation in their properties. They are crying out for proper accommodation.
The elderly also require proper housing. They have served the State well and built up a country that we can now enjoy. Their contribution, made through toil and sweat, created the Celtic tiger. Many of these people live in isolated rural areas and because of their fear of crime and their living conditions, they are anxious to move into proper accommodation. They must be housed as a matter of urgency. The third group consists of single parents. Thirty per cent of children are born outside of marriage and many single mothers are in need of accommodation. These young parents must often share a home with their own parents. They are caught in a trap whereby they cannot earn money and so provide a home for themselves.
There is a need to rationalise the schemes providing housing aid for the elderly and the essential repairs grant. They both cater for the same group of people. The waiting time in the Mid-Western Health Board area for the housing aid for the elderly scheme is deplorable. People wait up to three years. I know of one elderly person who suffered a stroke six months ago. She has an outside toilet and must cross the yard with the aid of a walking frame in order to use it. She needs proper toilet facilities urgently. There should not be a waiting list for people who need to have a shower installed because they can no longer use a bath. People are leaving hospital and must return to houses without shower facilities. There should be a thorough examination of the housing aid for the elderly scheme to ensure that it delivers a service to the people who have served this country.
I fully agree with previous speakers that it is totally unacceptable that 50,000 people are without central heating in their homes in the 21st century. We are all aware of constituents who must spend large amounts of money on solid fuel in order to provide heating for children with asthma or elderly infirm relatives. Local authority housing stock should have heating. The local authorities have a duty to ensure that their houses are up to standard. There is a lack of resources in many areas for repair and maintenance work on the housing stock. Repair work is often only partially completed or not done at all. We must develop the shared ownership scheme. It is an excellent scheme and I encourage people to use it. The Minister and his Department should fund and promote the scheme in a more generous way. It is a halfway stage between homelessness and house ownership and many people can move on from there within a few years and own their own homes. The concept of social housing is a very good one but it does not seem to be working. It is not being used effectively.
I welcome the opportunity to speak on Second Stage of this important Bill. I come from a constituency which has the luxury of being represented by the Minister for the Environment and Local Government and one would think we would therefore have no housing problems.
There are no problems out there.
There are problems with housing lists. There are between 700 and 1,000 people on the waiting list in County Meath. We have substantial numbers of people on the list in Navan. There are 30,000 local authority houses without heating. There is no proposal to help keep elderly people comfortable in their own homes. Provision of improved housing for the elderly is dear to the hearts of everyone in this House but we must have proper policies in place and a Minister and a Minister of State who will deal with the problems.
Substantial numbers of single parent families are living in rented accommodation which is not fit for human habitation. The local authorities are not inspecting these places. Ministers have allowed people to live in sub-standard accommodation during an economic boom.
House prices would not have risen so high if the Government of the day had provided sufficient moneys for enough serviced land for housing. Competition would then have kept down the price of houses. The scheme for social and affordable housing has been copied from the United Kingdom with a population of 60 million. In a population of four million it cannot be expected that 80% of those who can afford to purchase a house can carry the other 20%. I say to the Minister that it will not work. Our population could carry about 8%, not 20%. The Minister for Finance has overturned policies which were introduced and recommended by my colleague, the Minister for the Environment and Local Government, on the basis of the Bacon reports. I hope Mr. Bacon is still not on the payroll as one of the Government advisers. Thousands of people cannot afford to buy their own homes. The Government must provide the money for serviced land because sufficient supplies of serviced land will enable more houses to be provided. When the 20% social and affordable housing initiatives were introduced in County Meath, the manager decided to increase the local charges from £4,600 to £8,600. It is important for everybody to recognise that while the Government tells us it is doing something to provide people with their own homes, it takes 43% of the price of a typical first time buyer's three bed semi-detached house in the form of VAT and other taxes and charges.
The Government's policy on all of the issues I have raised has been a failure because when it took up office in 1997 nobody in the Department knew how to deal with the problems that were manifest. All the Government could do was to pay an outside adviser who has now gone to another country to undertake similar work. We have learned nothing from the years of trying to provide accommodation for ordinary people.
I am a member of Galway County Council and over the years I have been told of many different figures regarding the numbers on our housing list but none were as startling as the figure declared at a meeting of the council two months ago when it emerged that in our county there are 1,350 families on the housing list, far in excess of the highest previous number of 800 or 900. Why is it that so many families in County Galway cannot afford their own homes? There are many and varied reasons, which I do not have the time to address. However, during the term of office of this Government that cohort of people has been sidelined.
There has been a huge change in the social profile of those on the housing list. Heretofore most did not have a job or were on social welfare or in low paid jobs. However, many on today's list are in jobs which, in previous times, would have enabled them to buy their own home. How can this problem be addressed? Families on today's list would not want a local authority house if they could acquire their own home with reasonable help. An integrated approach to housing for this cohort of people is required. Without it we will get nowhere. Many of them are bitter that the Celtic tiger economy has meant greater difficulty in owning their own home than was the case three or four years ago.
The shared ownership scheme is good although it has many drawbacks which I do not have time to address. The scheme requires a greater degree of funding to enable it to be targeted at lower income groups. If at all possible, families should be given the opportunity to own their own homes and to take responsibility for them.
There have been a number of tenant purchase schemes, many of which have been successful. They could be applied to those who could own their own homes if they were given a little more encouragement. Maintenance problems do not arise where houses are owned. The owners will be house proud and this will have a knock-on effect in terms of enhancing the profile of the housing estate.
There is an acknowledged need to provide many more houses, both social and affordable. Despite occasional problems, affordable housing is a good concept that will be around for a long time. This House recently debated the issue of public private partnerships. There is much to be said for allowing small groups of builders to act in conjunction with local authorities and build social housing.
There are a number of reasons why the standard of local authority housing has increased very significantly. Tenants are as entitled as anybody else to be in a good house. More importantly, the stock of national housing is enhanced when good quality houses are built. There is worldwide evidence to show that when people are offered well apportioned and finished houses they are likely to remain in good condition, unlike houses of inferior quality. In this regard we should ensure that the input by architects into local authority housing programmes continues.
The provision of housing for the elderly by the Western Health Board in County Galway works relatively well but it has one huge drawback. An elderly person of, say, 80 years of age must often wait for up to two and half years to have a bath converted to a walk-in shower, despite the fact that conversion is not costly. It is very unfair, especially when people are granted approval but must then wait.
I welcome the opportunity to contribute to his debate. The Minister for the Environment and Local Government, Deputy Dempsey, the Minister of State, Dan Wallace, and especially the Minister of State with responsibility for housing, Deputy Molloy, have done Trojan work. The principal driving force behind the Bill is the need to make statutory provision for a number of measures aimed at increasing the provision of social and affordable housing.
I was interested to hear what the Minister had to say about helping young people gain access to the housing market. In his contribution he said he would update the power to pay new house grants and remove a small number of anomalies to ensure that, following a legal separation, applicants who are first time purchasers will be eligible for a grant. The Minister could go further in helping young people with housing grants. He said it was intended to look at more efficient use of energy, including the use of renewable forms of energy in line with the national climate change strategy. I would like more information on this because we all realise there are many difficulties facing young people in their efforts to obtain a house for themselves and their families.
Like other speakers, I welcome what has been said in relation to disabled persons' housing grants for which increased funding will be sought. One of the difficulties with this useful grant is that there is no consistency in the manner in which local authorities throughout the country operate the grant. For example, a provision was introduced some years ago to provide a grant for heating. That was a welcome initiative in most local authorities but the rate of grant paid varies. While a 90% grant is available for the installation of showers and improvements to bedrooms or bathrooms, a 50% grant is the maximum available for heating installation, certainly in Galway County. It may be different in other authorities. As other Deputies have said, the provision of a heating grant has to be a priority for local authorities whether for those with a disability or the elderly and it should be provided at the maximum rate in each local authority. The same is true of the essential repairs grant but certain works are not eligible for local authority grant purposes. There will always be duplication in respect of the essential repairs grant and the Western Health Board scheme for repairs for the elderly. While there are two bodies working in this area, the hope is that they can deal with the waiting list. There is a great need for the funding provided by the Minister and he has been generous in the way he has provided it. Given the waiting list which exists, there is a great need to have this work done.
I welcome the work being done by Respond and other voluntary housing bodies. I was struck by the professional way in which Respond operates in Galway, particularly the manner in which it deals with applications, communities and local authorities. I have noticed in recent months that Respond and other voluntary housing organisations are attaching an affordable housing scheme to the voluntary housing scheme. That has provided a nice mix of housing developments in towns and villages. In the village of Kilkerrin, County Galway, a good scheme provided by Respond is in progress at a cost of £1.2 million, which amounts to £66,000 per unit. This is good value for money and has provided great opportunities for families seeking housing to live in a village in which they want to live. All credit is due to Respond. Kilkerrin is one of those villages which is lucky to have a sewerage scheme. The issue of providing more funding for the smaller villages will have to be tackled. One reads in the newspapers every day about the millions of pounds being spent in Galway city. The provision of £1 million in each small village in east Galway would provide a sewerage scheme for that village.
When I approached the Minister, Deputy Dempsey, some years ago concerning a sewerage scheme for Williamstown, the cost of which was £1 million, he and his officials said that if a par ticular system, based on a reed bed treatment system, was used the cost could be reduced to £0.5 million. Those schemes are now in operation. When a sewerage scheme is put in place in a town or village it means a housing scheme can be developed at a faster rate.
The latest initiative on those sewerage schemes is what is known as a design, build and operate – DBO – scheme, which the Minister piloted in County Meath. Much progress has been made with the scheme throughout the country. In the village of Woodpark, near Portumna, that scheme will be used to provide a sewerage scheme for a townland which was omitted from the scheme in Portumna. I welcome that type of initiative. If that relatively small sum could be spent in every town and village there would be real development and more families living in those areas.
Recently when the Minister launched the RAPID programme I was to the fore in welcoming it because it applied to the towns of Tuam and Ballinasloe in my constituency. I was subsequently told I lived in the poverty zone. I recalled the musical, "Fiddler on the Roof", in which the leading character said, "to be poor is nothing to be ashamed of, but it is nothing to be proud of either." Tuam and Ballinasloe would be regarded as towns in the poorer regions if one were to apply the RAPID programme criteria but it means that whatever funds are available under the national development plan will go to such towns. Parts of Galway city come under the RAPID programme yet that city is one of which those who reside outside it are envious.
It is interesting to note that one of the reasons Tuam was designated as suitable for the RAPID programme was that it had a large number of local authority houses. I am not sure what those who designed the programme were talking about when they stated there were too many local authority houses. I am of the view that more such housing will have to be built. The more recent schemes have been well designed and finished. Where communities have made an effort to provide more housing, they should get assistance as is happening in Tuam and Ballinasloe.
Another development I welcome and one which is obvious on the ground is that many families are moving out of cities into the smaller towns. For example, people are moving out of the Galway Corporation area into the county council area. In the town of Headford I have met many who have moved from Galway city. They made the point that they are able to get a good quality house at a more reasonable price but they also want services, such as transport, that we take for granted. It is worth noting that local authorities have drawn up town plans for all these towns, including Headford and Athenry. The Government should ensure they contain plans for transport and education facilities. It is a very welcome sign of growth that the cities, which are getting too big, are spreading out to smaller towns.
Under the rural development scheme, families move back to smaller towns and villages which is a welcome development. Galway County Council, for example, has given priority to families who want to move from Dublin to Galway. There have been problems with the scheme caused by the poor condition of some of the houses allocated to the families. A further difficulty is the inability of families to buy the houses they have been allocated despite being willing and able to do so. In some cases, Galway County Council has come to the rescue by buying some of the houses. According to the old saying, a person's home is his castle. People should be given the opportunity to buy out houses if they so wish. At present, however, the elderly and people participating in the rural housing schemes have a problem doing so.
Another problem faced by the elderly is the cost of refuse collection. In County Galway and, I am sure, many other counties, refuse collection services have been privatised. Additional costs for the service providers at the tipheads, together with increased maintenance costs, whether in diesel or the costs associated with employing people, have led to difficulties which did not exist when local authorities were responsible for the service. It appears these issues were not fully thought out when people were allocated their houses.
Galway County Council and other councils have taken the very positive step of appointing housing liaison officers. I welcome this step, having seen them visiting and keeping in touch with families who are seeking housing. However, only two liaison officers have been appointed for the entire county which is the second largest in Ireland. It is very frustrating for people applying to the local authority under any scheme to have to wait for someone to call and investigate the most appropriate scheme for their circumstances. The liaison officers fulfil a very important role in this respect, visiting people and reporting back to the housing section of Galway County Council or the health board on which scheme is suitable for applicant families. I call for the appointment of further liaison officers.
The CLÁR programme announced by Minister of State at the Department of Agriculture, Food and Rural Development, Éamon Ó Cuív, will prove to be a very useful scheme. In announcing the programme, which is almost an adjunct of the RAPID programme, the Minister of State highlighted that some townlands and villages have lost half their population in a 70 year period. Two towns in this position are Milltown and Creggs, both of which are on a waiting list for sewerage schemes. Milltown is higher up the list than Creggs. If the Minister pursues his idea of giving 50-50 type grants, in conjunction with the Department of the Environment and Local Government, to towns and villages, there is no doubt they will get a sewerage scheme and housing will follow. The residents of Milltown, which has won the tidiest town competition in County Galway for the past four years as well as many regional awards, argue that, while it is a beautiful village located on the N17, no more houses can be built in it. The only way to build houses in Milltown, Creggs and similar places is to install a sewerage scheme.
I hope the Minister of State receives the necessary backing and support for the CLÁR programme, which is an excellent idea for creating another kind of rural renewal. I wish him success and hope it is properly funded. I welcome the Bill and hope the Minister will be able to put his proposals into practice as quickly as possible.
A Leas-Cheann Comhairle, with your permission, I will share my time with Deputies Ring and Seán Ryan.
This Bill is as the Minister described it when he stated "The Bill . . . is not as comprehensive as I would have liked. I have indicated a number of areas where further measures may be introduced on Committee Stage." It is too little, too late. For a Minister to wait five years to produce a Bill like this and make such an admission speaks for itself.
Hear, hear.
The Government does not lack initiative or imagination – there is a raft of schemes available for the provision of housing or housing facilities. The problem is one of a distinct lack of urgency and drive to achieve targets. Every public representative in the House faces the same range of problems with regard to the housing crisis. We are besieged by constituents trying to find out what can be done through the political process to help them achieve their ambition of owning a house or being allocated one. Although some of the schemes are very good, there has been no drive or consistent attempt on the part of the Government to achieve the highest targets. In the early 1980s, Castlebar Urban Council gave three bedroom houses to single mothers because there were no other applications for houses. The proviso it attached was that the houses might be taken back if families came on to the housing list.
Against the background of the best years we ever had and an urgent requirement to deal with housing, the Minister's performance has been pathetic. He stated that the affordable housing scheme enables local authorities to construct new houses which will be offered for sale to eligible purchasers at cost price and, accordingly, at a significant discount from the market value of comparable houses in the area and went on to say that the necessary funding to facilitate an output of 1,000 units per annum under this scheme has been provided for in the national development plan. He also stated that 300 units were completed last year with 150 completed so far this year and that 6,270 units were either under construction or planned. If 150 have been completed, does this mean that 6,120 remain to be completed this year? Will somebody spell out how many of the 6,120 units will actually be completed and how many are planned? Given that the Minister is aware of the range of problems we face, why is the scheme not driven forward more vigorously?
Section 17 gives the Housing Finance Agency powers to provide funding for non-housing related capital expenditure purposes. Is this a parallel scheme to public private partnerships, where the full operational and marginal costs will be recovered from non-domestic, commercial and industrial uses? The Government and the Department's drive to impose PPPs in towns like Castlebar, where there will be a £40 million scheme, will result in business people being fleeced over a 20 year period. Commercial rates will be imposed by another door if somebody does not explain what is going on here. Will the non-housing elements of housing works, such as water treatment, be provided by the Housing Finance Agency or local authorities? How will the moneys be recovered in schemes where there are no commercial or industrial users?
I compliment the architectural departments of county councils for building beautiful schemes in many parts of the country. There are a few such imaginative schemes in my far-flung western constituency, such as Inver, Barnatra, Ballyvary, Bohola and Achill. We need a streamlined system, however, so that the provision of housing can be much more efficient. The building unit of the Department of Education and Science has run together all the various stages that had to be passed, and may be able to spend another €100 million this year. I am quite sure that a similar situation applies in the case of local authorities. Once land is acquired by local authorities, we should try to achieve many more projects such as I have mentioned and on a much more efficient basis.
I seek a response to queries on the issue of the Traveller community, as the Minister's remarks, that he has asked the Minister for Justice, Equality and Law Reform to explore whether the movement of large scale encampments needs to be dealt with on a broader front, were a complete cop-out. Have we moved away from the promotion of halting sites as a solution to many of these problems? Nobody seems to be able to answer this question. The Government is committed to housing all Travellers, but no moves have been made on halting sites because of the impending election. It seems to me that the Government wants to acquire houses for Travellers willy-nilly. Will somebody explain the policy in this area?
A problem mentioned by a number of Deputies on the Government benches should be dealt with. Why do people have to wait for two years for a shower to be installed? They should be allowed to buy the equipment and contract someone to do the work. Local authorities could then make a grant payment and we would be finished with it. It is not right that people have to endure an endless bureaucratic process, including medical and engineering assessments and plans, during which time they move closer to leaving this mortal world we share. The essential repairs, disabled housing grant and voluntary housing schemes should be encouraged by the Minister to a far greater extent.
I would like to revisit the subject of grant payments that was raised by Deputy Kenny at the end of his contribution; in particular special housing aid for the elderly, essential repairs and disabled person's grants. The Deputy was right to suggest it is crazy to put people through the mill to save a very small amount of money. It takes so long for a grant application to be made that by the time it is approved by a health board or local authority, the cost of the work that is needed may have doubled. Why is it necessary to have so much red tape? If a scheme that costs less than €10,000 is genuinely needed, why can we not approve grant aid immediately? Payments can be made when it is certified that the work has been done.
I have been contacted by residents of County Mayo's three islands on many occasions in relation to another anomaly. Those who live on Clare Island, Inishbiggle and Inishturk often complain about the system of allocating grant aid to Gaeltacht residents. It is disgraceful that English speakers on Gaeltacht islands do not get certain grants as they cannot speak Irish. Island life is so tough that islanders should receive double the grant paid to those who live on the mainland, regardless of whether they speak Irish. Basic services often cost twice as much on islands as on the mainland because it is expensive to bring goods across the sea. The suffering of islanders, for example in relation to transport during bad weather, is shared by those who speak both languages. I would like to see grants for islanders doubled across the board, for those who live in Gaeltachtaí and those who do not. They should be treated equally.
Hear, hear.
The most recent census of population indicated that 1,900 people in County Mayo do not have a toilet or running water. Health boards and local authorities have adopted a policy of seeing people as elderly at the age of 65. I ask the Minister of State to send immediately a letter to local authorities and health boards telling them that a person is not of old age at 65. If a person of 55 or 58 needs a grant for a shower, bath or running water, they should not have to wait until their 65th birthday. I do not agree with the policy of approving grants only when people reach this age. I ask the Minister of State to eliminate this daft anomaly, as it deprives those in need of basic facilities from receiving the requisite grants. Cases were taken against local authorities and health boards as a result of what happened in nursing homes and I predict that somebody will take a similar case having been refused a grant for being 58 years of age.
I encourage those without a toilet or running water to apply for a grant immediately. For three years I have been demanding shower and bath facilities for a woman in my constituency, but the project will only begin next week because of red tape in the council and the health board. They even made this 80 year old woman go through the planning process so that she would no longer have to go to the toilet in a field every night. The matter should have been dealt with as soon as the application was made, but the health board was unable to do so. The health board should have ordered a contractor to do the work immediately without need for planning. There should be no restrictive criteria for anyone without running water or a toilet who applies for a grant to a local authority or health board. Permission should be granted immediately in such circumstances as it is disgraceful that people should have to do without these facilities in this day and age. I was outraged to be told that there were 1,900 such people when the last census was taken.
The housing crisis is a problem for many young people, who contact me every day looking for local authority housing. Students and those working in Dublin face similar difficulties. The Department of the Environment and Local Government will have to address the problems of those paying high rent, especially in Dublin. Subsidies or tax breaks are needed for those who find it difficult to find affordable accommodation. Students in Galway and other university towns have to pay above the odds for housing. There have never been so many young people on the housing list and there has never been such a poor return from local authorities.
The Minister of State, Deputy Dan Wallace, and his Department have to deal with the fact that many people who want to build homes in rural areas are being stopped by the planning process. Many people are applying for planning permission to build houses in the northern part of my constituency, but are frustrated by septic tank regulations and puraflow systems which cost a fortune. No houses would have been built 100 years ago if so many rules and regulations had existed. The Department of the Environment and Local Government will have to give people in rural areas an opportunity to build their own homes, especially in their own areas. Land owners should be allowed to build homes for their sons and daughters on their land instead of being pushed into towns.
I wish to refer to a category of people who have been discriminated against since the foundation of the State, namely, single men and women in their 50s and 60s who do not qualify for a council house simply because they are single. Some of these people do not have the means to buy their own homes. If they had the will, many local authorities could build apartments in towns and give these people an opportunity rather than debarring them because they are single and of a certain age. These people should be assisted by the State.
I am pleased to have the opportunity to speak on this Bill. The objectives of the shared ownership and affordable housing scheme are laudable in that they aim to facilitate access to full home ownership in two or more stages by persons who could not afford to buy their homes immediately. Given the cost of housing, this scheme should be operating in a more meaningful way. However, it is not being taken up by a sufficient number of eligible people and is not having the impact which it should have. One must ask the reason eligible people are not joining the scheme. We must examine and modifying the scheme where necessary, a point to which I will return.
The Minister of State continually highlights his objectives in the area of social and affordable housing. In his speech he stated that unprecedented progress has been made in meeting housing needs since this Government took office. However, it seems that the Minister of State and the Government are not living in the real world. The Government's housing policy has been an utter disaster. When it came into office there were approximately 26,000 applicants on local authority housing waiting lists. We cannot obtain the official figures as they will not be available until after May, but those involved in the area of housing have informed me that over 50,000 applicants are now on housing waiting lists. If one multiplies this figure by a conservative factor of three, it means that over 150,000 people – men, women and children – are living in deplorable, over-crowded conditions or in doorways and on the streets. This is the Government's record.
As public representatives we know of the situation regarding homeless people and those with a child, partner, husband or wife who, given the cost of rented accommodation, have to live with their parents in over-crowded conditions. Young and not so young couples with families are living in mobile homes. Last weekend I had to cross a few hundred yards of muck to get to a mobile home to meet a husband and wife and their two children. Condensation was dripping from the ceiling and the bed clothes were wet. A heater in the mobile home was the cause of the condensation, but these are the conditions in which this couple and their two children live. This is the Ireland of today. After five years of unprecedented growth and affluence over 150,000 people live in unacceptable conditions. How can the Government take credit for this situation? The people are waiting to give the Government its answer in the general election.
This Bill does nothing to rectify the shortcomings in the current social and affordable housing scheme, particularly with regard to income eligibility. A constituent of mine stated that the current limit of £25,000 for a single person precludes a significant number of people who would otherwise be unable to afford housing within Fingal County Council, which is my local authority area. The £25,000 income criteria has to be addressed.
My local authority has a priority list regarding social and affordable housing. Some people on the top of the list since 1998 have annually produced documentation regarding income. Is it right that after waiting for four years on the list and being eligible for the scheme, the income eligibility limit should change to £25,500 for a single person or a cumulative figure of over £62,250 for a couple? Something is wrong. Why is there a need for an income limit given that one is not entitled to a shared ownership or affordable housing loan if one does not qualify for a mortgage from a financial institution or building society? We must do away with the income limit.
Why is there a need for the 40% limit? Why is it not 30% and 70% rent? There are many elements to this issue and this is a good scheme. However, issues have to be dealt with and I hope that when the Minister of State responds to this debate he will give a commitment to put his record before the people. His record regarding housing is dismal and the young people are waiting for him.
Debate adjourned.