Catherine Murphy (Kildare North, Independent) | Oireachtas source

I discussed this issue earlier with the Minister for Social Protection as I was aware she would not be here this evening. This issue falls between two Departments, namely, the Departments of Social Protection and the Environment, Community and Local Government in terms of the provision of social housing. It is appropriate that this matter is being responded to by a Minister from the Department of Health because the problems arising are putting a great deal of stress on individuals in particular locations where this issue is presenting as a crisis. I use the word "crisis" advisedly.

We are now seeing families being made homeless due to the shortage of houses. There are just under 100,000 individuals or families on the housing waiting list across the country and about €403 million last year was spent allocating rent assistance to 82,000 separate cases. That is intended to be a short-term solution to a longer-term problem. We both know why houses are not being built at the moment. In some locations, the rent caps introduced by the Department of Social Protection are far below the market rents. In my own area, there has been a noticeable increase, even in the last six months, in rents that can be obtained on the open market. Increasingly we are seeing people saying "no rent assistance". If they do take rent assistance, it is far below what is on offer. People are trying to top it up themselves under the counter. Everybody is doing it, and not just in my area. This is hitting people who are not getting rent assistance, such as people who are trying to pay on a low wage. People who cannot work or who have not got a job can enter a poverty trap in trying to get back to work. I know this is supposed to be resolved with the HAP legislation if that does not produce the problems that I think it might.

I do not want to see large amounts of money going into landlords' pockets; I want to see a solution to people's housing problem. The environment committee met with some of the housing associations recently, and if we want to look at a longer term issue, the lack of capacity within the housing associations and the lack of a regulatory process means that we cannot leverage European funds that are not Exchequer funds to build social housing. Even if we could do so, that will be some time in the future.

The Department of Social Protection officials must meet officials from the Department of the Environment, Community and Local Government as a matter of urgency on the issue of the absolute crisis that we are seeing in locations. I know that local authority officials in Kildare contact the Department of the Environment, Community and Local Government on a weekly basis to tell them about the experiences they are having in not being able to source accommodation through the RAS scheme or through people being able to get housing themselves, with the rent caps that are in place. There is a real crisis out there.

About 100,000 individuals or families are on the waiting list. It is not the same experience around the country. Six local authority areas account for 43% of the entire waiting list. Three of them are in Dublin - South Dublin, Fingal and Dublin City - two are in Cork and one is in Kildare. Six other local authorities account for 3% of that waiting list, where there is not the same pressure because in the first six areas, house prices have started to bottom out, housing stock is in short supply and rents are starting to rise. The success stories, such as the few thousand people employed on the Intel site in Leixlip, mop up much of the availability of rental accommodation for people who are subject to the rent caps. While that is a good news story on one side, it produces a real crisis on the other side and managing that crisis is the key issue here.

I am looking for a dialogue between officials from the Department of the Environment, Community and Local Government and the Minister for Social Protection on how this can be managed, so that the people we are seeing in crisis at the moment may find some alleviation.

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