Eamonn Maloney (Dublin South West, Labour) | Oireachtas source

I welcome the Bill. I always make my welcome of Bills conditional. I do not think there is such a thing as perfect legislation that resolves every issue it is supposed to tackle. I welcome the thrust of the Bill and thank the Minister of State and her staff for their input.

I agree entirely with what Deputy Shortall said in her contribution, which I will not repeat, on anti-social behaviour. She also, correctly, raised the issue of tenancies.

In terms of the broader debate on the lack of housing, I have no doubt those on the opposite side will find opportunities to criticise the Minister of State. However, she cannot be held responsible for the collapse of capitalism following the end of the Celtic tiger. Some of those who were architects of that are not in the Chamber. Regardless of what is fired at the Minister of State about her efforts to try to resolve the emergency crisis, none of the blame rests with her. What she is doing is trying to sort out an absolute mess because of the effective abandonment of social housing, or council housing as I prefer to call it. When we debate housing issues, I always like to qualify my interest by saying I was born in a council house and I live in a council house. I am proud of both facts. I listened to some of the debate yesterday and today and I am not sure how often some speakers have been in a council house or council estate. That is another matter with which we are confronted during such debates - listening to people who are experts on how the rest of us should live and behave.

The Minister of State is trying to resolve an issue that started when I and other Members were members of local authorities. I was mayor of the second largest local authority, South Dublin County Council, and the best local authority in the country. I well remember being in the chair of the council at a monthly meeting in 2008 and having to read out a letter from the then Department of the Environment, Heritage and Local Government telling the second largest local authority, as it did other local authorities, that it could not build any houses because it would not get money to do so. That was the start of it. No council houses were to be built and that decision was followed year after year.

There are different aspects to what the Celtic tiger did for this country. Some people benefited but many others further down the social ladder never saw a shadow of it. That includes those who would have required social housing. In effect, part of the fall-out from the end of the Celtic tiger, apart from emigration and increased unemployment, was the abandonment of the building of council houses. The approach has continued. I dare say the Minister of State, the Acting Chairman, Deputy Buttimer, and others would be pleased if council houses were to built, but one needs money to do so. Given that one has an economy that is creeping its way up from the bottom, how can Members tell the Minister of State she must build hundreds of thousands of houses as if there was a war chest or money to be found in a garden at the back of Merrion Square? That is not the way things work in reality. People are being misled by some of the contributions. What interest does any Member of this House have in keeping people out of a home? A home is a basic social necessity. If we had money, we would build houses. Why would one not do so? In spite of the Bill’s shortcomings, I thank the Minister of State and her departmental staff for tackling, for the first time in many years, issues that require to be addressed.

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