Martin Ferris (Kerry North, Sinn Fein)

The media would have one believe that the phenomenon of housing waiting lists is peculiar to urban areas in major towns and cities. However, although the figures might be lower in rural areas, the damage inflicted by waiting lists and people being forced out of their communities in search of housing is even greater. While numbers might be smaller, so too are the communities themselves. Agricultural and fishing communities have come under sustained attack from the policies of the Government. During the summer, the Government abolished the sugar beet industry in this State. Yesterday, it announced the destruction of the drift net salmon fishing industry. Rural and coastal communities that are long-abandoned by the Government in its fanatical determination to ensure all investment is based around Dublin and its suburbs now find their existing industries under attack.

Housing is another example in which rural communities are left knocking on the door of the Dublin political establishment. Despite the growth in house building in recent years, rural communities constitute a section of society that has not reaped the benefits. While poverty, exclusion, unemployment and inadequate income are suffered in both rural and urban areas, they tend to manifest themselves differently in rural communities. Such results arise from different social factors such as depopulation and poor transport. Many areas in rural Ireland lack public transport and have limited access to other essential services and facilities. A key issue in rural communities is that the increasing cost of housing often leaves people priced out of the housing market. This means that people are forced to move to the nearest town, thus further depopulating their rural area. They are forced out to make room for holiday homes and getaway cottages for the business class and those same developers who profit from the loopholes introduced in Part V.

People from rural communities have a right to live in rural areas and have a right to demand that Government policy supports sustainable development. Many people brought up in a rural community wish to remain in a place where they feel secure in the knowledge that they belong in that community, which is built upon strong family connections. More importantly, such communities can only remain sustainable if people continue live in them. For too long, people living in the countryside have been neglected when it comes to housing. Due to inept Government policy, there is little opportunity for people to access housing in rural areas.

In my native county of Kerry, the number of people on council waiting lists jumped spectacularly between 2002 and 2005. The Kerry County Council housing waiting lists rose from 512 in 2002 to 883 in 2005. This constitutes a 72% increase within three years, which was the second largest percentage rise in this State. Astonishingly, Tralee Town Council's waiting list saw the State's largest increase, that is, an increase of 85% from 512 in 2002 to 948 in 2005. Moreover, Listowel Town Council's list increased by 22%. A total of 1,526 of the 1,657 new houses completed in Kerry between January and July 2006 were privately built. In other words, 131 social or affordable houses were built in that time.

Addressing the inadequacies of rural housing policy by amending Part V to insist on the figure of 20% of new development, regardless of whether it is in urban or rural settings, will go some way to providing social or affordable housing for people in rural areas. In the past, the Government has been unwilling to acknowledge the local authority waiting lists in rural areas. More often than not, the right to have a home in one's own community has been extinguished——

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