Tony Gregory (Dublin Central, Independent)

I will share time with Deputies Finian McGrath, Catherine Murphy, Healy, Connolly, Boyle and Morgan.

I support the motion because it focuses attention on what is correctly described as the single worst poverty trap in Irish society. The denial of rent supplement to people on low incomes obliges them to spend a large proportion of their income on paying rent to private landlords. Many people on social welfare who desperately want to work cannot take up employment because they would lose their rent supplement and be crippled with high rents. That provides a massive disincentive to work.

Another aspect of the scandal is the low rent supplement available to single people, for whom the maximum supplement is €120 a week. I have received many calls from single people who have told me they cannot find a half decent flat in Dublin city for that amount of money. They are left with little choice, as they must choose between being homeless and being ghettoised in tenement-like tenancies in Dickensian conditions reminiscent of a Dublin of long ago. Parts of my constituency — I will not stigmatise them further by naming them here — are well on the way to becoming ghettos in which landlords allow their properties to degenerate into unhealthy and unsafe fire hazards. Only the poorest people desperate for a roof over their heads tolerate such conditions. All this is taking place in the Ireland of the Celtic tiger, so it is little wonder that the National Economic and Social Forum described ours as one of the most unequal societies in the world today.

This major issue is not being tackled by the Minister of State, Deputy Noel Ahern. As the anti-drugs activist Fergus McCabe said outside the Dáil today, the Minister of State has special responsibility for two of the most important social issues — housing and drugs — and he is neglecting both of them. Each of those issues clearly requires the full attention of a separate Minister of State.

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