Apropos of the issues that dominate the public debate inside and outside of this House with regard to the dual issues of inflation and housing, and recognising the difficulties overcome by the Government, the successes of Government and the accelerated plan that is now showing results, and notwithstanding the Opposition's claim that the Government has been in government for ten years, six of which were controlled by the IMF - everyone knows that except the Opposition - notwithstanding the success so far, can I ask if it might be considered to set up a task force to examine the obstacles to an accelerated housing programme at this moment? As the Ceann Comhairle and I know, there are many such obstacles in planning, in appeals, in the various systems and judicial reviews around infrastructure development, in procurement and so on that are holding up the advanced acceleration of a housing programme, which we urgently need.

We need to do everything possible to accelerate the number of new homes being built. As I said earlier, it is accelerating. Some 25,000 new homes were built in the past 12 months, 35,000 are under construction and 45,000 are going through planning. One can really see that pipeline coming through. It took us a while to get there, and we are still only getting there, but it is coming through. There are more things that need to be done to speed it up. The Minister of State, Deputy Burke, and the Minister, Deputy Darragh O'Brien, are working on reforms to our planning laws because often it is planning issues that delay the construction of new homes. They plan to bring in statutory timelines for An Bord Pleanála so that decisions do not get stuck in An Bord Pleanála for too long. They will also seek to change some of the rules around judicial reviews so that more important housing developments and infrastructure developments do not get caught up in the courts for too long.