Mairead Farrell (Galway West, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

There are a few points to make in response. The first relates to home ownership and young people being able to afford a home and to leave their parents' home. A friend of mine, who is the exact same age, 33, was in touch with me this week. She got engaged at Christmas. Planning her wedding should be a lovely, exciting time for her but she says it is putting far too much stress and pressure on her at this time. She is in shared accommodation with her husband-to-be. They cannot plan a wedding because they will not be able to afford it with the amount of rent they pay. They have no chance of home ownership. They are very concerned that they cannot have children. They do not want to bring a baby into shared accommodation. They fear that by the time they can afford a home, she will not be able to have a child. That is a real-life impact that this is having. There are so many different stories about the different ways it is impacting, but that is one of them.

The Taoiseach referred to the likes of the help-to-buy scheme. He knows my party's position on that. The few friends who have had the opportunity to buy have all said the same thing. These are not people who are engaged in political activity on a daily basis or anything like that, but they all say the same thing, namely, that the scheme has increased the prices.

To go back to the eviction ban, I heard the housing Minister say on TV the other night that he knows it will increase homelessness. Given that we have record numbers of homelessness, I cannot understand how the Government would remove the eviction ban when it knows it will increase homelessness and knows the impact it will have on families. I understand the Taoiseach does not have the figures in front of him, but I assumed he would have a general understanding of how many free emergency accommodation units are available in each local authority. For the first time ever in Galway city, I have seen a waiting list for emergency accommodation. I have never seen that before. We have seen in Scotland that the decision has been made to extend the eviction ban until at least 30 September. I cannot understand how the Taoiseach can stand over this decision. Will he look back at it at all? Does he feel he can stand over it when he knows it will increase homelessness and the impact it will have on families and children?