Ciarán Cuffe (Dún Laoghaire, Green Party)

I welcome the motion tabled by the Labour Party. It is important to bring attention to the challenges that face us with regard to housing.

The motion points out, rightly, that there are important issues to address in respect of housing policy in Ireland. The broad range of changes we have seen in housing, social housing and policy over the past ten years have been, in general, positive. By way of circular letter and changes in legislation, we have seen a move away from the very large local authority housing estates that characterised housing policy in the 1970s, up to the late 1980s and early 1990s. There has been a move away from the very strong segregation of private and public housing. I look back on some of the schemes that were built over the past ten or 15 years and see that there has been a quantum change and improvement in the quality of housing on offer. When one considers that, and puts it together with the improvements in building performance in respect of energy performance brought in by my colleague, the Minister for the Environment, Heritage and Local Government, Deputy John Gormley, we can see the bar is set much higher today than it was in years past. In housing provision the emphasis must be on quality as well as quantity.

It is important to applaud the successes of the voluntary housing agencies that have been at work. They moved in to play a central role in the provision of housing construction and management. In many respects that is a positive situation. One can look at the record of local authorities, particularly one such as Dublin City Council over the years. It has been one of the largest, if not the largest, landlords in the State. It has had a chequered record in management and maintenance of its own housing stock. The addition of the voluntary and social housing agencies that play a very valuable role has been an important one. That role is set to continue.

In my area of Dún Laoghaire-Rathdown, I note very significant new housing developments that will be under the control of the National Association of Building Co-operatives and other agencies involved in housing construction. This is a positive role.

The targets were set quite high in the national development plan but we are not far off them. Last year, in Towards 2016, we had a record 9,000 social housing starts. That is not bad. We could do a lot better but it is a step in the right direction.

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