I am glad to get the opportunity to speak. As the Taoiseach knows, I travel nearly every road in Kerry on a consistent basis. One of the roads I travel very often is the road from Kenmare, through Kilgarvan, down to Clonkeen then Flesk and into Killarney. Without going along the road, I can count in my head that there are 55 vacant houses from the top of the town in Kenmare down to the Kerry Way in the Curraglass townland. That is hardly going up or down any of the byroads off that - a short walking distance maybe. There is a certain amount of public transport on this road.

Why are these houses vacant? Can we do anything? We must explore every avenue we can when we hear about the housing crisis and people ending up without a home. Surely we should be doing more to entice the owners of these houses into the rental market. We certainly know that the tax at 52% or 56% is keeping many of them out of that market.

Owners in this area will not command large rents. They will only get €600 or €700 a month. After paying tax, they only have €300 to pay the bills.

Confidence is gone in the private rental market and people are afraid that they will lose their houses and be unable to get them back when they want them. They have the right to get their houses back. Will the Government do something to relax the rules of the Residential Tenancies Board, RTB, which are too stringent and restrictive and prevent people from entering the market?

Will the Government also do something for those who are without a home, cannot find a house to rent and are not on the housing list? We must help people who are on the housing list, but those who are not on it need a house as much as everyone else. They cannot afford to buy but are just above the threshold to join the housing list. Could we involve local authorities in renting houses? Perhaps they could succeed. People are afraid they will not get their houses back if they go private.

The Government was able to offer €800 tax free to house owners who accommodated Ukrainians. Why can we not offer the same sum to accommodate our own people? Surely our own people are first and foremost. The Ukrainians are not to blame for the misfortune that has befallen them, but our people must be looked after. This is one of the areas I am asking the Government to explore.

Thanks very much, Deputy. There are a lot of vacant homes around the country. The Deputy sees them on his travels - I see them on my travels as well - around the country. That is particularly the case in more rural areas like south Kerry. Our colleague, Deputy Griffin, has documented this and photographed it. He has done a whole dossier on it, which he has shared with me. Deputy Healy-Rae is essentially making the same point.

The number of homes that are habitable is relatively low, but they do exist. Regarding the habitable ones, the ones that are liveable, the vacant property tax will apply from this year. For those that are not habitable, are derelict and need a bit of work before someone can live in them, we now have the Croí Cónaithe fund. We have just announced that it will be extended, not just for people who will do up the building and live in it but also for people who will do up the building and rent it out. It is hoped that will make a big difference over the next couple of months or at least the next year or so.

There is a fund for local authorities to make compulsory purchase orders, CPOs, in respect of derelict properties and bring them back into use. Some local authorities are better at doing that than others, but the fund exists. There is also the repair and lease scheme, with which the Deputy will be familiar. We are calling on local authorities in particular to take a lead on this. Some local authorities like Waterford are particularly good. Others are not so good. Every local authority has funding for a full-time derelict homes officer whose job is essentially to lead this. Some big counties like Cork and maybe counties like Kerry where there are a lot of derelict properties may need more than one derelict homes officer and it might be a job for more than one person. We are setting up a section within the Department of Housing, Local Government and Heritage dedicated to the whole issue of vacancy and vacant homes.

We are going to examine the question of how we tax small landlords. We have committed to that. We are going to get that work done as soon as we can with a view to making changes in the next budget.

It is the case that people receive €800 tax free to accommodate Ukrainians in, for example, holiday homes, but they are not permitted to charge any more than that. That must be borne in mind. There is a tax relief - it is €800 tax free - but people cannot charge more than €800. It is important to bear that in mind in the discussion. Actually, they cannot charge anything.

Regarding the €800, if the local authority rented the property from the house owner and the tenant was able to, he or she should pay according to his or her means and circumstances. I object in the strongest way to the Government's proposal that houses should be compulsorily purchased. Instead, the Government should talk to the owners and try to find out whether they would be interested or, if they had a problem, try to deal with it. The Government should certainly not go down the road of CPOs because it will turn every landowner and house owner against it. That is what owners were afraid was happening in the Dáil today. If they are banned from getting their houses back, it would be the same as an extension of going down the CPO route, which I do not want.

There is much that we can do together, that being, to explore why these houses are vacant. There are vacant houses up all the other roads around Rathmore, Scartaglin, Gneeveguilla, Brosna and Knocknagoshel. There should be no one homeless. For people who came to this country fleeing the war, we were able to help them with transport and so on. The same could be organised as well.

I thank the Deputy. We are over time.

We need to do more because the State will never be able to build enough new houses.

We are way over time, Deputy.

It is a plus and a big bonus and start that we have these houses.

I do not think that a CPO should ever be the first option, but it should be an option that we have if people refuse to sell or bring a property into use and sit on a derelict property for years. That is why we have the fund to do that. Some local authorities have led the way on that. Others have been far too slow.

The whole issue of vacant properties is a very interesting one. The Government published a really good vacant homes strategy not too long ago. It points out there are roughly 160,000 vacant properties - vacant homes - in the State, but as is always the case, it is much more complicated when you dig into it. A huge number of those homes - in fact, the vast majority of them - are either for sale or to let, being renovated, the people who owned them died recently, the people who own them are in hospital or nursing homes, or the people who own them cannot be traced. That takes the 160,000 figure down to actually a much smaller number, but there are still thousands of homes that are vacant that could be brought back into use. I have set out the measures we are taking to make that happen.