I was born and reared in, and am proud to come from and represent, a rural constituency. I have a major concern regarding couples or individuals who are building one-off homes in rural areas. They are ending up having to pay significant development contributions to local authorities, on average well in excess of €5,000. The development levy waiver introduced by the previous Government was a super initiative. It helped to bolster housing supply and ensure a big pipeline of housing deliver. We saw some of the largest commencement numbers ever last year, with more than 60,000 homes commenced, about 10% of which were first-time, one-off homes. People in rural areas do not feel like it is a fair charge because if they are building in a rural area, they do not get public lights or footpaths and the money that is paid is not specifically ring-fenced for a particular area. I am asking the Taoiseach, given that we are in a housing crisis, to consider the reintroduction of the development levy waiver for one-off homes in rural areas. This will facilitate young people who are starting out their journey of home ownership and trying to self-build. They could do it without the extra burden of costs.

I thank the Deputy for raising what is an important issue for rural people in general who want to build one-off housing. The Minister is revising the guidelines in respect of this issue. On the development levies, we got 60,000 commencements. We now need to see them concluded. The Deputy has asked that we explore demarcation between one-off and general schemes, because we brought the VAT rate down to facilitate apartment-building and get critical mass back into that. I will talk to the Ministers with a view to looking at that or a specific ring-fenced initiative.