The housing crisis also exists in rural counties, including in my constituency of Cavan-Monaghan. Hundreds of people have been on housing waiting lists for years. In the past two years Cavan County Council has delivered 120 social houses. Of that 120, only six are houses the local authority built itself. There is something fundamentally wrong when a local authority can deliver only six built houses over two years even though the council was capable of providing schemes of 70 or 80 houses a number of years ago. Will the Minister ensure that assistance is given to the local authorities? They have lost the capacity to do this and to deliver on it. The building of just six houses over two years is very disappointing.

I thank the Deputy for the question. In the past two years since Rebuilding Ireland began, the number of people on the housing list has fallen by about 20,000. That is because local authorities throughout the country are implementing solutions to get people into social homes. As the Taoiseach mentioned earlier, we do not have an ideological objection over how they do that; we want it to happen as quickly as possible. That involves building homes, acquiring homes and long-term leasing. A number of local authorities do not have the experience necessary at the moment to meet current housing demand because previous governments outsourced their responsibility almost exclusively to the private sector. This Government has taken that responsibility back into the State and into the local authorities.

It is not happening. There have only been six in two years.

That is why I have been working with the local authorities' chief executives to get them to build thousands of homes.