I raise the legacy of strategic housing developments, SHDs. These were a policy of the previous Fine Gael-led Government, which was backed by Fianna Fáil. SHDs bypassed local area development plans and were fast-tracked by the Government to facilitate the vulture and cuckoo funds, something we have seen over the last couple of weeks.

I want to bring a bit of reality into this. Drimnagh in my constituency has a very strong community, which has campaigned relentlessly on behalf of residents seeking sports facilities, extra medical services, community hubs and everything that voluntary groups do right throughout the city. In many ways, the neglect over time by local authorities after the crash and everything else is less obvious due to the tremendous work done by these volunteers.

With the policies of SHDs and rezoning brownfield sites to residential zone 1 sites, this community is facing a build in progress on the Dulux site with 265 apartments in eight-storey blocks, all built to rent and all with one or two bedrooms. On the Heidelberg-Miller site on the Davitt Road, there will be 188 apartments in a nine-storey block, again built to rent with one or two bedrooms. There is no dual aspect for the properties and little communal space or storage. There is a pre-consultation process ongoing for Brickfield Drive, which will have 282 apartments in four-storey to ten-storey blocks, built for purchase, with 10% of the properties under Part V and 90% to be sold to a cuckoo fund or investment. There is also the G4S site on Herberton Road, with 170 apartments, and that is a pre-consultation phase so we do not know exactly what is going on there.

With those SHDs, we are talking about 2,000 extra people in the community so what is the Government going to do about the legacy of these projects in the community? Will it fund local authorities so they in turn can fund communities to get in more medical and educational services or more green spaces and community hubs? These communities will need those because of this extra development in the area.

These communities may see an extra 5,000 people in the area with other developments, which is the size of a small town. What analysis has been made and how will these communities be supported in building sustainable neighbourhoods?

I agree with pretty much every one of the Deputy's comments about getting the balance right. We need to provide housing for young people and it must be close to the city centre, of high quality and in large numbers. The strategic housing development approach will not continue after early next year. It will be wound down and it will mean we will, correctly, have to rely on our councils to get much of this right. The council must deliver a range of other services, as well as housing, to get the balance right for good quality living. This means there should be local green space, good bus services, local shops and community centres, as well as work nearby. It is balanced development, which means it is not all housing in one place and work somewhere else. We want mixed development and we can get it right.

Height is probably the most contentious issue right across the city, particularly now. We cannot keep going up. I rely a lot in this regard on the likes of Ciaran Cuffe MEP whom the Deputy will know from the council and who has real planning expertise. He makes the point that the sense of community weakens slightly when buildings go over a certain height. This is site-specific and it depends on neighbours, for example. Costs also go up when heights increase. There is a balance to be struck. This might be four, five or six storeys. Other cities do it, and the likes of Paris and Barcelona, which are historically famous, get the balance right between density and quality. There is a sense of connection or community that may be lost when we go with some of the really high developments that have been suggested.

We need density, though, and this sometimes requires difficult decisions. We also need other services that require difficult decisions. The BusConnects project is on my desk and I hope that can go to planning very shortly. That will be key in bringing down cost. For example, we do not need car parking for everyone. If we thought about this and designed projects well, we could reduce the cost of apartments by not having to build expensive and extensive car parking but rather having other solutions to give people a really high quality of life. We must get that mix or balance right.

This is not easy and no one idea for what we need to do might have more virtue than another idea. I agree with the Deputy's basic premise. We need to go back, in a sense, to relying on local democratic systems in some of this planning. We should not allow a free-for-all with height. That would not work.

I thank the Minister for the reply but what will the Government do about the legacy of these projects? It is okay to say Drimnagh is close to the city and it is on the Luas line but what will the Government do for these communities? Has it done an analysis of the impact of these high-rise developments?

Section QH18 of the Dublin City Development Plan 2016-2022 indicates the aim "to promote the provision of high-quality apartments within sustainable neighbourhoods by achieving suitable levels of amenity within individual apartments, and within each apartment development, and ensuring that suitable social infrastructure and other support facilities are available in the neighbourhood, in accordance with the standards for residential accommodation." These strategic housing developments have totally bypassed the local area plans and local democracy in the city, and the Government allowed that to happen. How will it respond to the communities to support them financially with community centres, hubs, villages, education, medical and primary care units? They will need all of these for the extra people in the community. The Government cannot just leave them behind and say a mistake was made.

All of the SHDs may not go ahead. There are legal challenges and questions about some of them, and I understand many of those challenges have been successful. Within the provisions there is a "use it or lose it" clause for them to be built by a certain time. There is an underlying problem in our city with the cost of construction and the viability of it and the ability to have an affordable option for purchase or sale. One of the key solutions is for us to build ourselves, particularly on public land.

We are agreed that we must go back to stronger local democratic involvement in development, so the key issue for the coming six or nine months is the local development plans throughout the country. The Deputy mentions details about mixed development and the zoning we do, and that is a function of local councils and in the power of councillors at a local level.

If the Government can introduce a policy to bypass the councils, what is the point in having them?

That is where we must work as well as here. The practical measures must include what the councils can do through local development plans. We will back this up and support the process as best we can with the likes of investment in public transport and other measures.