Thomas Gould (Cork North Central, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

It is as simple as this. The Minister and the Government have to recognise this now. It is unbelievable that we are listening this morning to comments from Government Deputies who do not accept the facts. My colleague, Deputy Ó Broin, our party and other parties on the left have been calling for a massive housebuilding programme for some time. That is the only thing that can solve the housing crisis. What we have in the LDA Bill and the Affordable Housing Bill does not go anywhere near far enough to deliver the houses we need. The Government parties of Fianna Fáil, Fine Gael and the Green Party do not realise this. Is it that they do not realise it or that they do not accept that their policies are wrong and will not deliver the housing we need? The housing crisis did not start today or yesterday. We have been in this for ten years. We know that the only way out of it is to build houses.

Deputy McAuliffe talked about how we spend €500 million a year on HAP. It is unbelievable that that is a Government strategy to try to deal with the housing crisis-----