Ciarán Lynch (Cork South Central, Labour)

I move:

"That Dáil Éireann:

expressing its serious concern at:

the huge increase in the numbers on social housing lists which have jumped from 43,700 to nearly 60,000, an increase of more than 30% in just three years;

the continuing problem of homelessness, with an estimated 5,000 experiencing homelessness at any one time;

the worrying increase in the number of repossession orders for family homes being sought in the courts;

the need for the proper implementation of an inspection regime regarding housing standards in the rental sector;

the ongoing difficulties faced by many residents in both apartments and housing estates as a result of the unregulated operation of management companies; and

the failure of the Government to honour the commitment contained in the programme for Government to expand delivery of social and affordable housing options to meet the needs of 90,000 households;

calls on the Government to:

take steps to ensure that, where possible, existing, unsold housing units are secured for purposes of social housing;

approve the construction of an additional 10,000 social housing units each year for the next three years;

make rent supplement (RS) more employment friendly by bringing means assessment into line with differential rent schemes;

enhance families' access to the rental accommodation scheme;

adequately resource and fully implement, "The Way Home", a strategy to address adult homelessness;

negotiate a new code of practice with the financial institutions providing for a moratorium on repossession orders for family homes during the current recession;

amend the Residential Tenancies Act 2004 to provide for the creation of a national inspection regime regarding housing standards in the rental sector, along with the establishment of effective and efficient timeframes in which disputes should be resolved;

publish as a matter of urgency a Bill, based on the draft provided by the Law Reform Commission, aimed at reforming the law on multi-unit developments including apartment developments;

strengthen the powers of local authorities to deal with anti-social behaviour; and

broaden the terms of the current tenant purchase scheme along with allowing local authority tenants the right to buy their apartments."

I wish to share time with Deputies Upton, Ó Snodaigh and Ferris.

The motion I put before the Dáil jointly on behalf of the Labour Party and Sinn Féin calls for a moratorium on house repossessions, an expanded programme of social housing, new measures to deal with the problem of homelessness, stronger protection for tenants in rented accommodation and legislation to regulate the activities of management companies.

As we approach Christmas 2008 there are more people than ever on social housing waiting lists, an unprecedented number of families are facing the threat of having their homes repossessed and homelessness is as prevalent as ever.

The threat of losing a home is possibly the greatest fear a family can face. As unemployment grows, more and more families who took on heavy mortgage repayments, based on incomes they were then earning, now find that, as a result of the loss of one job or more, they are coming under pressure from financial institutions. A spate of repossession orders in the new year could create a social disaster and the Government must negotiate a moratorium on repossession orders for the duration of this recession. I note from this morning's newspapers that 14,000 households are over three months in arrears.

The social housing figures published last week showed a jump from 43,700 to nearly 60,000 in just three years in the social housing list. What is truly shocking about this figure is that the Government has presided over a doubling in the social housing list over the past ten years. These figures show the extent to which Fianna Fáil squandered the boom, leaving tens of thousands of families high and dry without adequate housing. An expanded social housing programme would not only provide families with badly needed accommodation, but would also help to put the construction sector back to work.

No Member of this House should need to be reminded about the issue of homelessness when we see the persons huddling in the porches and alleyways around Leinster House each evening. Despite this daily reminder, there are an estimated 5,000 experiencing homelessness at any given time, almost 500 of whom are children. It is in this context that I put the motion before the House.

It is clear that as far as the Government is concerned it is a case of "Crisis? What Crisis?". How you define a housing crisis is determined by how you define the purpose of housing. Do you see it as a commodity? Do you see it as a home? Do you want to build developments or do you want to create communities? Ultimately, do you want developer-led Government or Government-led development?

When this Government came to power the average house cost three times the income of a working family spread over a 20 year mortgage. Just before the housing pyramid collapsed the cost of an average house had risen to 12 times the average income, with a mortgage of 30 plus years now the norm. In the period 1997 to 2007 residential mortgage debt in Ireland grew to an extraordinary 522%. Many made money from home buyers in that period as the market rose and many will continue to make money as these mortgages continue to be paid over the coming decades.

How did this happen? The answer is simple. Those who had a duty of care — Government, regulators and banking institutions — all neglected that duty and this country's future was invested in a property bubble. An example of this mindset was best captured in April 2006 when the then Taoiseach, Deputy Bertie Ahern, spoke about the "health" of the housing market and sneered at economists who predicted a collapse. With chest out he proudly proclaimed that people who listened to the "loo-las" would have missed the boat and would have to pay more for their houses at that time. This is the type of frightening talk we are more used to hearing coming from dodgy salesmen, with a mantra that you should get in and buy now or you will have to pay even more later.

It did not matter to Deputy Ahern or his Government that the cost of buying a home was out of control and running beyond the grasp of working people. It did not matter that families were being locked into mortgages that would take them their entire working lives to clear. It did not matter to them, in those sunny days, that when a rainy day came people would be in danger of losing their homes because of their recklessness.

This motion, once and for all, seeks to banish the mindset that the primary purpose of housing development is profit for speculators. This motion proposes that housing development, whether private or public, is to meet the needs of society in providing people with homes of a quality standard, at an affordable cost and providing long-term security.

If there has been a consistent theme to how Fianna Fáil's developer-led Government has been focused towards the housing market over the years, it has been to focus on sorting out the developers, and on getting new developments built; and then at some stage in the future maybe get around to sorting the problems of schools, transportation, green spaces, common areas etc. In the private rental sector, for example, figures I obtained show that less than one in ten houses are inspected for standards. The figures produced by the Department of the Environment, Heritage and Local Government show that less than 6% of 188,000 registered private rented dwellings were inspected in 2007. The Minister, Deputy Gormley, speaks of introducing guidelines and "a dedicated stream of money" to local authorities to carry out inspections but it seems he neither has the determination nor the powers to ensure that inspections are carried out and that standards are enforced. The result is that, despite promises of legislation, vulnerable people are left without protection.

Just like social housing, the private rented sector fills an important function providing necessary housing for hundreds of thousands of people. However, it is unacceptable that, despite the legislation in place, and the promise of even more in 2009, adequate enforcement of standards is still not in place.

What is needed to ensure standards in the rental sector, whether private or social, is the creation of a national inspection regime ensuring that standards are enforced and which would guarantee the establishment of effective and efficient timeframes in which disputes would be resolved and, in the case of local authority housing, determine an acceptable period in which urgent repairs must be carried out.

The problems relating to management companies are well understood and have been analysed to a great extent by the Office of the Director of Corporate Enforcement.

These companies, many of which were set up by developers, need to be regulated in the interest of residents rather than developers. The fact that they are currently in a legal no man's land is causing endless trouble for affected residents. For several years, the Government has spoken about the need for legislation in this area but we are continually fobbed off with policy reviews and committee meetings. This motion calls for less conversation from this Government and a lot more action.

If we were to look to the long-awaited Housing (Miscellaneous Provisions) Bill 2008 as a remedy to the issues identified in this motion we would be well and truly disappointed. That Bill was expected to deal with homelessness but, embarrassingly, this issue was omitted when it was first published. The Government was shamed into cutting, copying and pasting a paragraph on homelessness into the Bill when it was debated in the Seanad. The Bill's response to anti-social behaviour is to load additional bureaucratic nonsense upon local authorities without giving them any additional powers. This will only add to the frustration that currently arises when residents make a complaint and find their situation has not improved at the end of a long and futile merry-go-round.

The biggest indictment of the Bill is its revelation that the mentality of the Galway tent is still alive and well when it comes to promoting tenant purchase schemes. The significant changes in this area are targeted towards shifting property described as "new build". There will, therefore, be no new incentives to regenerate existing communities by allowing tenants to purchase their homes. In fact the Bill could cause a repeat of the exodus in the 1980s of earning residents from local authority estates, a mistake for which we are still paying the social and financial costs. The Bill in its present form continues to ignore tenants of local authority flats, who have been left in the lurch for years and denied the right to buy their homes. It intends instead to introduce a purchase scheme confined exclusively to new build property, whereby people who have been assessed for social housing can get a loan up to €285,000 from a local authority once they have been refused a mortgage by at least two lending institutions. Ironically, this is going to be called the first choice purchase scheme. As everyone knows, people are refused mortgages for two reasons. One is that the evidence indicates the prospective lender cannot pay back the loan and the second is that the property is over valued. What purpose will this scheme serve other than to provide a sub-prime lending service and set a false floor price for new houses in a declining yet still over valued property market?

While this country is no longer as wealthy as before, it is wealthy enough to be ashamed of its record on homelessness. With housing vacancy rates in Ireland of 15%, it is unacceptable that 5,000 people will be on the streets this winter. We need a strategy which enables homeless people to make the successful transition from temporary emergency shelter to long-term accommodation. This can only be done if the proper rehabilitation processes are in place and on the basis of a cross departmental and interagency approach.

Even in today's falling housing market, hard working couples can find that the cost of buying a home exceeds ten times their income. If they are waiting for social housing they can find their names have gone backwards rather than forwards on an ever increasing list. If they live in the rental sector they cannot be confident that the basic guaranteed standards will be enforced. For too long, this Government's housing policy has been driven by the needs of everyone but home dwellers. The situation badly needs to be changed and the motion before the Dáil demands that we get our priorities right and our house in order. It is time to end developer led Government and to put in its place Government led development, whereby house prices are driven by affordability rather than speculation, standards are enforced and not just put on paper and communities instead of housing developments are built. We need to look beyond the bricks and mortar to insist on a future built on a foundation of social conscience and integrity. I commend this motion to the house.

See this speech in context