As there was yesterday, there will be a bonus in the form of an extra question but the Deputy must exercise self-discipline.

I thank the Leas-Cheann Comhairle. The young have long been treated as an easy target for budget cuts. In the first few austerity budgets, young people were singled out for particularly vindictive treatment. Third level fees skyrocketed, there were cutbacks to unemployment benefits for those under 25 and youth services were cut to the bone. The message of successive Governments, first that of Fianna Fáil and the Green Party and then that of Fine Gael and Labour, was that the country could not afford young people and perhaps they could try their luck elsewhere. As a result, tens of thousands of people, including dozens I grew up with, left for Western Australia, Canada, London, the United States and countless other places. Those left behind faced unemployment or underemployment and miserly supports if they could not find a job.

The Taoiseach is fond of telling the House of his republic of opportunity. Young people do not want a hand-out or any special pleading but only the opportunity to have a decent standard of living. However, my generation is being denied the opportunities that previous generations took for granted. There was little in the budget to convince those who travelled to the four corners of the world there is anything in this republic of opportunity for them to come home to. Some 15,000 students marched outside Leinster House last week seeking respite from the crippling fees that are discouraging many from pursuing the education that could give them real opportunities. However, the Government appears deaf to their demands. The Government also appears to be militantly opposed to equal pay for equal work for young workers in the public sector. I remind the Tánaiste that the youth unemployment rate remains at 15%. Those who do not have work face discrimination because of reduced unemployment benefit regardless of circumstance or whether they have mouths to feed or rent to pay.

Earlier this year, the Taoiseach, who was then Minister for Social Protection, confirmed to me that Ireland had drawn down none of the Youth Guarantee funding available to it in the previous year, so the indifference of the Government to young unemployed people should come as no surprise.

Housing is the key issue for young people. The average rent is Dublin is now €1,700 and the average purchase price of a property is €250,000 countrywide and much higher in Dublin and Cork. People are breaking their backs just to keep the roof of a cold poky flat over their heads.

The young of this country have the opportunity to be blocked from getting a third level education, to face discrimination in pay and unemployment benefits, to live from one short-term contract to the next while earning pathetic pay, to pay a third or half their income on rent and to be locked out of the housing market. When will the Government begin to deliver a republic of opportunity for my generation and to give them the opportunity to ever own their own home? At present, that is nothing but a pipe dream.

The best message from the Government to the next generation is that we have a republic of opportunity, which is created by managing the economy and ensuring there is money to invest in services. If the economy is not managed properly there will not be funding available to invest in services such as education and the others the Deputy mentioned. The budget contained the highest-ever allocation for education, involving an increase of €554 million or 5.8% to more than €10 billion. It provided for 2,000 new teachers and special needs assistants. Overall Government investment increased by more than €1 billion in budgets 2017 and 2018. We have moved from having an unemployment rate of more than 15% to full employment being expected next year. That is a message of hope for the children in the country and for the people who left the country, many of whom, thankfully, are returning to take up the jobs the Government is ensuring are available. Job creation offers hope to young people in the country and those who have gone abroad but who can now return to jobs. That is the reality of the situation. It is a different reality to that depicted by the Deputy. This is the first time in ten years that a Government has been able to ensure that we can live within our means and doing that means we can provide the kind of future we want, one in which people have access to housing, a health service that works for them and the kind of education that is needed.

In terms of training for young people, there will be a fund to ensure that training courses are available for young people to develop the kind of skills that employers need. There is an increase in apprenticeships, which is a very important route to jobs for many young people and one in which there was underinvestment previously. However, decisions made by the Government will ensure that a range of training initiatives will be available to young people to ensure they will be skilled and will have the education for the kind of work that will come on stream in the new digital economy.

There has been very successful ICT training for young people which has ensured they have been job ready. Taken together, all of this gives hope to young people and ensures they will have a bright future in their own country.

The Tánaiste referred to 15% unemployment. As I said, that is still the rate for young people. She spoke of the reality I outlined. That is the reality for young workers. Any young workers to whom I speak are on a treadmill that is getting faster and faster as the cost of everything that matters to them in their lives, whether insurance, housing or anything else, increasingly outstrips any increases in their pay. They simply cannot keep up and they feel locked out. I meet such people in my clinics every week.

I raised with the Tánaiste the specific issue of housing. The Government and Fianna Fáil said this budget would be measured on the basis of what it did in housing. If that is so, it has surely failed in that there will be no new social housing beyond what has been already announced and, incredibly, literally nothing on affordable housing. This is a hammer blow to the ambitions of thousands. This is a huge category of people, ranging from those in the tech professions in Dublin to tradespeople in Limerick. It is a wide variety of people from all sorts of backgrounds who are unable to qualify for social housing and cannot get mortgages, and this Government is doing literally nothing for them. They come to my clinics and ask me what options they have. They have none, and this Government is doing nothing about it. It made an announcement about the possibility of an affordable housing scheme this year. There was nothing in this budget on that. For seven years Fine Gael has been in Government. The Government talks about working families. That is absolute cant to those who are simply paying a fortune on rent and have no prospect-----

I call the Tánaiste to respond. Otherwise, we will run out of time.

-----on the basis of the Government's policies of ever having a permanent home.

Quite a number of initiatives were announced as part of the budget by the Minister, Deputy Murphy, on Tuesday.

Not on affordable housing.

We have removed many of the obstacles to affordable supply.

No, you have not.

It is very important to acknowledge this.

Not affordable supply.

Budget 2018 removes remaining significant obstacles to the building of more homes more quickly and at more affordable prices through a number of measures, for example, by investing more in direct housebuilding, removing the capital gains tax initiative to hold on to residential land, escalating penalties for land hoarding, introducing new affordability measures and providing a new, more affordable finance vehicle for builders.

None of which will affect the supply of affordable homes.

This will ensure that the new supply is delivered at more affordable prices.

What price?

The Tánaiste, without interruption.

The various initiatives that have been taken will ensure a more affordable supply of housing. Home Building Finance Ireland, the new entity announced by the Minister, will provide finance at commercially competitive rates for developers with sites ready to go. The second local infrastructure housing activation fund, LIHAF, of €50 million will also make a difference. A whole range of initiatives is being taken that will ensure a more affordable supply of housing-----

What price?

-----next year and beyond.