The new buzzword of this Government is "infrastructure". It blames local authorities, Uisce Éireann, the NTA and An Coimisiún Pleanála for things. The Government blames everyone. I do not know if the Minister of State gets it. Does he think we are all fools over here? We are not fools; we know what is happening. Those opposite are in government. Fine Gael has been in office 15 years and Fianna Fáil for 11. All of these problems were caused by them; they were not caused by us. Now, the Government has come out with this new infrastructure plan. It is trying to pass the buck. Will someone in this Government ever stand up and take responsibility for their job? Ultimately, the Government is responsible but is not providing solutions. We on the Opposition benches are trying to give it solutions. We want to work with it. We want to do so because the people we represent have no housing and cannot get hospital appointments. There is a crisis in this country. What has the Government done? It has brought out a new, shiny booklet that looks great. It runs to 140 pages, 110 of which outline the problems and indicate why there is a crisis and an emergency in the area of housing. The document does not say that the Government has been in power for the past 15 years. The Government is blaming everyone else. There are 30 actions in this plan that are listed out across 30 pages. The Government must be trying to destroy the rainforests in the Amazon. It has produced a 140-page document, but for what? One of the actions in the plan for delivering housing - this is going to fix the housing crisis - relates to enhancing Government communication and promoting the importance of infrastructure delivery. Is the Government serious? Can the Minister of State seriously stand over this kind of bull? People are crying out for homes. Nearly 6,000 children are homeless. Three generations of families are living in box bedrooms. There are towns and villages in which houses cannot be built because there is no wastewater infrastructure. The Government talks about better communication. Will it build houses? Will it get Irish Water to deliver water and the infrastructure we need? Do not blame the NTA. Do not blame Uisce Éireann. Do not blame TII and, certainly, do not blame An Coimisiún Pleanála. For years, the Government underfunded the latter. It knew there was a backlog and it did nothing. It has now come out with this document, which outlines what it is going to do. The Government should do its job and build houses. That is what it needs to do. That is what people want the Government to do. We will work with the Government. I do not believe the Government wants to solve the housing crisis. If it did, it would not be putting forward stuff like this that is nonsensical.

Sentiment score: -0.05