I welcome the housing figures announced yesterday. It is really encouraging to see that there has been a 34% increase in commencements in the past seven months, that there have been strong completions and that 30,000 first-time mortgages were approved in the past 12 months. I request that the Land Development Agency, LDA, acquire more sites with full planning permission. It has acquired 2,500 in my constituency, which is a very strong and encouraging sign. Could there be more innovation in using the cities fund to ensure that more affordable LDA homes are available for purchase? Virtually all of them are available only for cost rental but there is very strong interest in affordable purchase. The LDA needs to bring about more of that.

I thank the Deputy very much for his question. I have the Housing for All action plan update to hand. The graph on page 3 tells a great story. We went from building fewer than 7,000 new homes in 2011 to building just under 30,000 last year. We will build well over 30,000 next year, meaning more than a quadrupling of the number of new homes built in the past ten years. We need to do even more than that over the next couple of years to reduce the housing deficit. Of course, the LDA is part of that.

On the Deputy's suggestion on acquiring more sites, I will certainly raise it with the Minister, Deputy Darragh O'Brien, to determine whether it is possible. I agree with Deputy Bruton on affordable purchase. We are doing really well in providing new social housing units and want to continue with that. Cost rental is now a reality but I would like to see more on the affordable purchase side in our cities. People are saying to me that it is great to see so much new social housing in their areas but that they are not seeing enough affordable purchase housing. I agree we need more of that.