First of all, Mr. O'Brien, thank you for taking your time. I know you have a busy schedule. First of all, this conference, this Housing Minister conference here. What is the outtake for you? What do you bring back to Ireland for this? Well, I think. Fundamentally the first thing is right. The way across Europe, we have challenges on providing affordable housing for our people in particular, and getting states to ramp up their delivery of social housing too. So these events are very useful from a collaborative collaboration perspective and a learning perspective from other states, and it's good to see it back on the agenda. The Spanish presidency had it on the agenda. The Belgians have now followed. But the signing of the declaration, I think, will be important in the sense it commits all member states to at least an annual conference in relation to the provision of affordable housing and indeed, social housing for our people. Now, we've embarked on a very significant programme in Ireland. We're three years into our new housing for all plant, and we're delivering more new social homes than we've ever done before. We're investing €5 billion per annum in capital and also affordable housing, because it's the it is one of the biggest issues for our citizens in the European Union. Yeah. I was going to say, uh, I have colleagues who visited Ireland just recently, visited Dublin recently, and it's a burning platform, as you might say. Uh, the crisis is evident in Dublin. Uh, -why did it come so far? -Well, I think we ten years of very significant undersupply before this government came in. And that was a legacy from the financial crash, too. But previous governments had not invested enough in the state being involved in housing. So we set quite exacting targets. So in the first two years of housing for all, we've exceeded our targets, both in private overall delivery and that encompasses both private, affordable and social housing. We'll publish our figures for 2023. Uh, we set a target of 32,000 and we built, sorry, excuse me, of 29,000, and we built 32,695 new homes last year, but also focusing on the area vacancy, which came up and is coming up today, how we can use, utilise the stock better. We're making progress in Ireland. We've since I came in as minister, we've delivered 100,000 new homes and built, but we have more to do because we are dealing with with a legacy issue of not enough being built fundamentally and also a pent up demand that's there. So you the whole network of Housing Europe, which my CEO, Mr. Martin, is, is ahead of this. As president, what can you use from that network? What kind of inspiration and maybe even models can you bring back to your island? Well, I've had extensive engagement with Housing Europe and with Bente Madsen himself and his team. Indeed, Edwards and and and Daragh Turnbull and they've been very useful and one making sure we get the information of what other EU states are doing. So I'll give you one practical example. When I came in as minister in 2020, we had no cost rental, affordable cost rental, a new form of tenure which was in place in some parts of continental Europe. I've legislated for that now. I've established it and we've thousands of tenancies approved now. Um, and that came directly from my collaboration through Housing Europe. I've attended a number of events with Bente, and we've been able to share as well what we're doing in Ireland and that some states see our housing delivery is right now, particularly on the social and affordable side, is being very impressive. We need to do more as well. But and in the area of homelessness, um, you know, which is a challenge for right across the European Union. So that sharing of information and also being able to access experts in the area, like in Housing Europe, where just to be able to add to discuss through potential policy initiatives. The policy is one thing and then the implementation is another. But it's been very useful. And I think housing Europe themselves have been a really good bridge for me, certainly. And I can say, as Irish Minister for housing in accessing information from other EU states in a very practical level as to what's being done there. Now, you're saying this is a legacy issue as well in Ireland and bringing legacy. You can't do anything without learning from the past, as you say. Right. So so how do we avoid falling into this again with this massive housing crisis when we -finally, uh, make a solution? -For sure? It's a very fair point. I think fundamentally, every state needs to be involved and needs to lead by example. And that's what we're doing in Ireland by investing €5 billion a year. And what that does is unlock other investment because we need to work with the private sector. The state cannot do it all. But I think long term plans that are that are easily understood, but really importantly are backed financially. So the housing for all plan in Ireland is a multiannual but fully funded plan. So I know what capital I have into the future. And that also helps the development sector understand that the state is stepping in. And particularly if you look at this year, over the last 12 months, very high cost of construction and high inflation also, but also cost of interest rates and cost of borrowing is up. So. If we did not actually step in, we would have seen, you know, probably half the homes built in Ireland are backed by the state now. So we would be looking at our output being halved. And interestingly, with the Euro Construct report by EY was published just before Christmas, that compared 19 European countries in relation to construction activity. And Ireland was the only one of those 19 that grew in 2023 and is projected to grow this year again. Again, the only one growing by 4.4% this year. And one of the main reasons put in in that place was that the states investment is sizeable. So how do we learn? I think that's fundamentally what we learned, that the state needs to be involved. And secondly, and not to, um, repeat the mistakes of the past. We need to deliver a sustainable housing sector right the way across Europe. And a house and a home needs to be seen not as a commodity anymore, not in relation to an investment anymore, as we do need investment. It's a fundamental right for people, particularly for our younger people and not so young. The people who want to be able to buy, uh, who work hard and we support them in Ireland, but in shared equity scheme with a grant towards their deposit as well, which is working very well because as I mentioned in the plenary session just just this morning, that if our young people who are working hard feel that they have no stake in their own country within the European Union, that has very serious political consequences to that, people can move towards the extremes. We certainly don't want to see that. So it's our job as legislators and as leaders within our own country and within the European Union that we can that we effectively deal with this issue and at least show where progress is being made and that there is hope and there is optimism that we're getting to grips -with this problem. -Mr. O'Brien, thank you very much. My pleasure. Now you have to go back into the room. So thank you for your time. -My pleasure. Thank you. Thanks indeed. -Thank you.