asked the Minister for Economic Planning and Development if, with reference to the recent Government Green Paper, paragraph 5.16, he will clarify what is meant by "an adequate supply of houses""acceptable prices", and "an appropriate form" of mortgage finance.
Ceisteanna—Questions . Oral Answers . - Housing Needs .
9.
: The Green Paper indicated that it is the Government's policy to ensure that as many people as possible are able to purchase their own houses rather than have to rely on rented accommodation. It is difficult to quantify what prospective purchasers will need in this regard since this is related to a number of factors including the future rate of household formation, the size of families and the needs arising from future obsolescence, which cannot be determined accurately. Needs will be kept under review to ensure that there will be enough small to medium-size houses available to those who require them at prices which the majority of such persons can afford. Mortgage finance should be available from the main lending agencies to enable persons wishing to buy houses to obtain the necessary loans without unwarranted delays or unduly onerous conditions.
: Would the Minister accept that, with the failure of successive Governments to control in some way the price of building land, more particularly in areas such as his own constituency, it is now quite impossible for any lower middle income family or any middle income family to buy a house at what the Minister terms in his Green Paper as an acceptable price and with an appropriate form of mortgage? In fact, the proposition in the Green Paper is becoming increasingly illusory.
: I recognise that the price of building land is a relevant factor in the cost of housing, but it is a separate question to discuss the ways in which——
: It is very germane at £10,000 a site.
: With reference to the honourable commitment of the Government to try to provide houses for as many people as possible, nevertheless the kind of language used in the question and in the Green Paper, such as "an adequate supply of houses", "acceptable prices" and "an appropriate form" of mortgage finance, is so nebulous as to render the whole point of the paper and this paragraph meaningless. What does the Minister mean by "an adequate supply of houses" and "acceptable prices" and will he say acceptable to whom? Would he agree that a price which would be acceptable to a builder would be very far from being acceptable to a would-be purchaser? What does he mean by "an appropriate form" of mortgage finance?
: It does not mean some sort of statistical quantification which I thought was under-lying some of the Deputy's desire for questions of this nature. If the Deputy deplores the sort of language used here, I can only point out that it would become impossible to draft any document, or make any statement on anything, if you were not allowed to use language in the normal everyday sense of the term.
: I am very much in favour of the English language and, over the past four or five years, I have done my best to teach it and to further its ends. Nevertheless. where language is so nebulous as to be meaningless it brings into question the whole credibility of the Government's exercise. Is that not a reasonable proposition?
: These questions are ranging into a debate on the paper.
: It is waffle.
: If the Deputy is interested in prose expositions as against numerical statements, no doubt we can arrange to have that debated on a suitable occasion.
: Let us have the numerical approach. How many houses?
: The Deputy is entering into argument.
: As the Minister knows, in many cases half the income, and in some cases in excess of half the income of the average family, is being paid to service loans for private houses. How does he propose to reduce that to an acceptable level, acceptable to the purchaser, the loan payer, to, say, 30 per cent of his gross income?
: There are two points there. First, I would have thought that in the majority or generality of cases the Deputy wants to ensure that the costs of acquiring housing accommodation do not represent an excessive burden on the household concerned. Secondly, I would not like to imply that we have moved towards a situation where somebody would be prevented from spending on housing whatever proportion of his household income he feels is appropriate.
: Would the Minister accept that all the reviews and the deep scrutiny going on are forcing people into houses they cannot afford, instead of the Minister's Government providing housing for them through the local authorities? There is to be a cut-back in local authority housing which will force people into purchasing houses which they cannot afford.
: I do not accept that reviews by Governments are forcing people into high price accommodation.
: That is the actual result of them.
: Arising out of the Minister's reply to the debate on the English language which the rest of us found interesting, could I ask the Minister would he consider at some stage giving the percentage figure of average income which normally should go towards repayments on loans and so on?
: I would need a definition of "normal".
: We need a definition of everything the Minister says.