The local authority is.
TDs / James Browne
James Browne
Minister for Housing, Local Government and Heritage
Portrait: © Houses of the Oireachtas (Oireachtas (Open Data) PSI Licence) · source file
0
questions asked
Members of the Government answer questions rather than ask them
145,875
words spoken in the chamber
145,131 as a minister, 744 as a TD
431
votes recorded
Each Yes, No or Abstained in a recorded vote
From the Dáil chamber only: committee meetings are not in this archive.
Members of the Government answer parliamentary questions rather than ask them, so this page lists none of theirs.
Month by month
Low months are usually recesses, when the Dáil does not sit. The archive runs to 22 October 2026.
Contributions to debates 670 in all
Dec 2024Oct 2026
Show as a table
| Month | Contributions |
|---|---|
| December 2024 | 0 |
| January 2025 | 0 |
| February 2025 | 13 |
| March 2025 | 36 |
| April 2025 | 15 |
| May 2025 | 46 |
| June 2025 | 41 |
| July 2025 | 60 |
| August 2025 | 0 |
| September 2025 | 32 |
| October 2025 | 59 |
| November 2025 | 46 |
| December 2025 | 20 |
| January 2026 | 51 |
| February 2026 | 43 |
| March 2026 | 43 |
| April 2026 | 3 |
| May 2026 | 70 |
| June 2026 | 27 |
| July 2026 | 22 |
| August 2026 | 0 |
| September 2026 | 2 |
| October 2026 | 41 |
Debates they spoke in most
Plus 394 contributions in the regular slots, such as Leaders' Questions and Priority Questions. Speech from the chair is not counted.
Party, constituency and offices
- constituency Wexford 29 November 2024 to now
- party Fianna Fáil 29 November 2024 to now
- office Minister for Housing, Local Government and Heritage 23 January 2025 to now
There are houses built.
No.
The Minister's responsibility is-----
Yes, because it is the local authority.
He is asking me.
You want to take away the help-the-to-buy scheme from that family to help them buy a home.
I thank the Deputy. Addressing homelessness and in particular homeless families and children is a priority for me, the Department and the Government. Ireland signed the Lisbon declaration in June 2021 which committed all signatories to work towards ending homelessness by 2030. I will continue to work with the National Homeless Action Committee to ensure an all-of-government approach to drive the ambition of the Lisbo…
With our new housing plan, we are developing the homelessness prevention framework. Significant work has been ongoing in relation to that, working with all the NGOs. I acknowledge the good work by Focus Ireland and the Simon Communities of Ireland. When I became Minister for housing, the first thing I did was visit all of the homeless organisations at their sites to get the necessary information. They have been front…
As the Deputy rightly points out, there is significant additional funding for homelessness in yesterday’s budget. As the Deputy knows, budgets are always broad strokes. You are dealing with multiple Departments and within those Departments there are multiple areas. I will, through the Revised Estimates Volume, work out exactly how we will allocate this funding and how we will use it. In particular, the homeless preve…
The Land Development Agency is a key part of the Government’s housing strategy in delivering affordable homes for rent and sale in communities right across Ireland. The Department of Finance’s report on the sustainable funding options for the Land Development Agency considered the financing needs of the LDA and the implications of this need on the business model and operational activities of the agency. This report a…
That is exactly what the Department of Finance did, working with the Department of housing. It looked at how the LDA is financed and how it can be financed into the future and examining the remit of the LDA. We have agreed to expand its role.
The LDA will be absolutely critical. It will very soon be the largest housing delivery body in this country. We are fully committed to expanding its role and using financing to…
I have been heavily engaged with the LDA. I meet it regularly. It is anxious to have that direct delivery model, which is what it has been moving towards as quickly as possible. The key is that we get properties delivered. As I say, I much prefer the direct delivery model and to get the private market delivering on the private sector side of things. That is where we are heading and where much of my wider decision-mak…
I thank the Deputy for his question.
I confirm that there are no approval lags for CREL funding. There is an approval process for funding applications to ensure compliance with the scheme conditions and value for money for the Exchequer. This is, as it should be, a requirement under public financial procedures. A necessary process should not be misrepresented as a delay.
Since July last year, the average time taken…
I reject the premise that there have been delays. For example, 54 CREL projects have been approved since the beginning of July last year and the average number of working days was 48 for this period. The processing times for individual applications can vary for the reasons I have outlined. That said, the trend is that projects are taking less and less time to assess. For example, projects submitted from July to Decem…
We are not in that situation at the moment. As I said, we are processing these ever more quickly. As I said, it took 15 days, on average, in the first six months of this year to process these applications. I encourage applications. There is an issue there, as the Deputy rightly pointed out, in terms of CALF and CREL not being aligned. It is something that the Department with AHBs and local authorities have to work on…
On 10 June 2025, the Government approved stronger tenancy protections and greater certainty for the rental sector, including the introduction of a national rent control. From 1 March 2026, a national rent control will be introduced for all tenancies, which will limit rent increases for properties other than new build apartments to inflation at CPI up to a maximum of 2% and for new build apartments rent increases will…
The changes will apply prospectively. That was made clear yesterday. In terms of the savings-----
Prospectively.
They will apply to new tenancies where designated as cost rental. The LDA sought this change so that it could deliver lower rents for people and that is why we agreed to it. As it is a cost rental measure, I fully expect, even through the metrics of the system, that it will result in lower rents for future tenancies.
All of the details around the various tax breaks, which Minister Donohoe worked on with the Department of housing to ensure we can increase the viability of apartments and get them and housing in general delivered, will be worked out over the coming weeks and then announced.
The purpose of the tax cuts is to bring about that viability so that we can get apartments that people need built. Off plan, there are over 40,…
I thank the Deputy for the question. Significant progress has been made on establishing the housing activation office. Senior specialists from Uisce Éireann, ESB Networks, the NTA, Transport Infrastructure Ireland and the local government sector are in place. In addition, senior staff from my Department with expertise in planning and project and programme management are assigned to the office. Further administrative …
The housing activation office is just one piece of an important set of measures we will take to ensure we can unlock housing delivery. We have our State agencies, but the housing activation office will be able to work with those Stage agencies where they identify that land can be freed up very quickly for housing delivery to ensure that utilities are in place. The HAO itself has that fund where it needs to spend mone…
That work remains ongoing, but the head is not critical to this. As has been demonstrated, all the key experts are in place. The departmental staff are in place. The work is already well under way. We are engaging with local authorities. We are meeting with the relevant groups. That activity is being driven now as quickly as possible.
The Deputy’s party does not support those schemes but we will continue as a Government to support those individuals and couples to be able to get their foot on the property ladder.