Joan Collins (Dublin South Central, People Before Profit Alliance) | Oireachtas source

I am not blaming anyone in particular, but we all know the housing problem has arisen from the dependence of successive Governments on the private rented sector and developers to provide housing. That policy was wrong before, is wrong now and will be wrong in the future. It has surprised many that the price of land is going up again. Irish housebuilder New Generation Homes, the first into the market to buy land on the outskirts of Dublin, has pulled out of it because it believes the price of land has gone too high. We will be facing a situation in the future where people will not be able to afford to buy homes. As banks will not lend to those who do not have a permanent income, many more will not be able to get a mortgage because they do not have permanent jobs anymore.

We have had three years of a Labour Party-Fine Gael Government and watched this crisis develop. I remember in 2010 putting forward a motion at a Dublin City Council meeting calling for NAMA properties to be brought under local authority control because of the looming housing crisis. The crisis has not happened in the last month. It has been developing for the past six years, even during the so-called “Celtic tiger” years. It is not good enough for the Minister of State to claim we have a serious problem. We are facing a disaster. Do she not realise this? When people come-----

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