Eoin Ó Broin (Dublin Mid West, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

I thank the Minister for corresponding with Lucan community college's Amnesty International group of students. I presented the Minister with a series of petitions the students had collected on foot of a sleep-out they did recently, which all of the local Deputies attended. I suggest, given the really good work of that group, that the Minister might invite them in to meet him and talk through some of things they discussed with us as Members of the Oireachtas in the constituency. They had some very powerful real-life experiences the Minister would benefit from hearing.

I have specific questions but I want to respond to what I have heard so far. In my opinion, and the Minister knows this, Rebuilding Ireland is not working. Let me deal specifically with the arguments the Minister made to justify his claim that it is.

He stated that supply was finally being delivered. Progress on the central supply target of Rebuilding Ireland is far behind the target, which was for an average of 25,000 new home completions each year over the lifetime of the plan. I welcome the 18,000 homes completed last year but that is not what is in the plan. To meet that central object of Rebuilding Ireland, it will be necessary to achieve 30,000 completions this year and even more than that next year and the year after. It is unfortunate that the Minister is presenting missed targets as significant progress. The Minister is correct that the CSO data are spot on but most independent observers know that progress is significantly behind the target.

I also think the Minister's position on the monthly report is disappointing. The Minister is again correct when he states it does not give us the background detail for which many of us have been asking. The report does give us a point-in-time way of tracking the trend. I appreciate the current incumbent was not the Minister when the monthly reporting was agreed but some of the strongest advocates of monthly reporting were academics and homeless service providers. They realised the value of having that point-in-time tracker in addition to having more in-depth quarterly reports. It gives us valuable information and we are one of only two member states in the European Union to have this system in place, as far as I know. We should not underestimate its value. It does not do all of the other things the Minister mentioned but it was never meant to.

I look forward to the publication of the more detailed quarterly reports. We do not know, for example, the average length of time that a family spends in emergency accommodation. We have some of that information in respect of Dublin City Council but not for the rest of the country. We also do not have information on whether an "exit", as the Minister describes it, from homelessness refers to someone leaving emergency accommodation or somebody being prevented from going into emergency accommodation through access to homeless HAP before the notice to quit expires. Those are important things that we need to understand and the sooner we get that information the better.

The Minister also referred to an eightfold increase in social housing. I commented on this issue to the Minister of State, Deputy English, during the debates on the right to housing. Other parties can speak for themselves but our party is not stating that no social housing is being delivered. We are stating, however, that what is being delivered is nowhere near enough. An eightfold increase sounds impressive, until we realise that there was virtually nothing eight years ago. Eight times nothing is not particularly impressive.

Deputy Cullinane is correct. Real social housing need in his county and every county in the country is increasing. We define real housing need as those people who are in need of real, permanent and secure long-term social housing tenancies. Those are generally properties owned by the approved housing body sector or local government. Adding those people on housing lists and HAP to those in insecure tenancies, the numbers overall are increasing significantly. We are also concerned that the number of new households entering onto the local authority housing lists every year is greater than the number of real social housing units being delivered. That is according to the Minister's own figures. Some 14,000 households came onto the list last year, while the total for real social housing provided was about 7,000. Current provision is not catching up with either existing or new needs.

The Minister described yet another increase in the homeless figures as "disappointing". It is not disappointing; it is deeply concerning that these figures continue to go in the wrong direction despite all the actions listed and all the work of the Minister, his officials and those in the local authorities and approved housing bodies. That is so concerning that using words like "disappointing" does not capture the gravity of the situation. The Opposition parties have passed a range of measures but the Minister continues to ignore them. After the scandal revealed by the "RTÉ Investigates" Nightmare to Let programme, a motion was passed with cross-party support recommending a range of measures for improving the private rental sector. Every party on the Opposition benches supported that motion but the Minister has acted on none of those recommendations.

On 3 October last year, a significant motion was passed with a range of policy alternatives. The Minister has also set his face against almost all of those. I acknowledge that the Minister has responded to some things on which Opposition Members and this committee have worked, including short-term lettings and strengthening the powers of the RTB. Those are, however, peripheral issues. I want to respond to all of these points. I am concerned that we still do not have the full roll-out of the national quality standards framework inspections of all emergency accommodation, voluntary and private. The current inspections are not independent. I ask the Minister to comment on whether we are ever going to have fully independent inspections of all emergency accommodation.

I am growing increasingly concerned at what I am hearing about the entry rents for the cost rental model. It was originally meant to be €1,600 a month in Dún Laoghaire-Rathdown. It is now down to €1,200 or €1,300 but is far above what the people who need much of this accommodation can afford. These projects are also taking far too long. I would like the Minister to give the committee updates on each of the individual projects under way, such as Enniskerry Road, St. Michael's etc. Turning to the co-living issue, I would have no difficulty with the concept if there was a way of controlling it and we could ensure that the idea was intended only for upwardly-mobile professionals who wanted to live in that type of accommodation for a short time. My worry is that short-term investors will build these types of projects. They will start off as the type of accommodation described by the Minister. Those short-term investors will then flip the buildings, however, to take advantage of the generous tax incentives introduced by the Government. Those developments will then become slums or tenements in the future. That is my big concern. How will the Minister prevent that from happening? I am not asking if he agrees with a particular planning application but about a later stage when these projects are sold on. How do we prevent them becoming substandard accommodation for people with no choices?

On the approved housing bodies, I am again concerned that there is very little evidence that the Minister's Department and the Department of Finance are progressing the reclassification of the approved housing bodies. That is going to have an impact on the Government's balance sheet and the ability of that sector to deliver in the future. We also heard from the Minister's officials at one of our earlier meetings that the near zero energy building, NZEB, regulations are going to be published soon. It is disappointing that a targeted phase-out date will not be included for gas boilers. I urge the Minister to reconsider that. I know there are issues regarding skills in the marketplace but I think that those regulations have to have a phase-out target date. Preferably, that would be 2021 for gas boilers. That is what is needed if we are to meet our climate change targets.

Turning to the rental stock, as the Minister is aware, we have lost 12,000 or 13,000 rental properties since January 2017 according to the RTB. We need to track the loss of properties and not landlords. That is what is really important. The vast majority of those properties, from the information that we have, were owned by one-off, accidental semi-professional landlords who had been stuck in negative equity. Those landlords are now exiting the market because there is positive equity. I have not seen or heard anything from the Minister or his officials concerning measures to try to prevent the disorderly exit of those types of properties from the market. I know that is going to be difficult. The Minister will probably tell me that increased supply from institutional investors is part of the solution. What is the Minister going to do, however, to stop the exit of these vital properties from the rental market? Clearly, that is one of the key drivers of the increased homeless figures we have seen today.