Ruth Coppinger (Dublin West, Socialist Party) | Oireachtas source

I start by sending the full support of the Anti-Austerity Alliance to the secondary school teachers today.

I do not feel I have any choice but to raise with the Tánaiste the disaster of the housing crisis. All the signs are that the Government's housing strategy is a bumbling disaster. Even if its myriad plans ever emerge, it will take years for houses to actually be built. The top management in Dublin City Council has confirmed to me that no serious amount of houses will be built for at least two years. Fingal County Council, which is the Tánaiste's own local authority, has a staggering figure of 38 new builds planned so the figures just do not stack up. In fact, the Tánaiste seems to be oblivious to a housing crisis in her own area of Dublin 15 and Dublin West. Families in Dublin West are becoming homeless for a second time. Not a single new council house is planned for the greater Blanchardstown area, which is in the Tánaiste's constituency.

While the Government is sweeping rough sleepers off the streets and putting them indoors, whole family homelessness is continuing unabated. The mix will be added to by a crackdown by the banks to repossess homes, including buy-to-lets, with no protection for tenants in those properties. Since families cannot expect a home any time soon from this Government, can the Tánaiste tell us what it is going to do in the meantime?

The one tiny measure it took to prevent homelessness was to set up a Threshold emergency helpline to negotiate rent supplement increases behind closed doors. The Government could have allowed community welfare officers to do this anyway but they do not have any power to keep people in their homes in the case of repossession or eviction. Interestingly, 47% of calls to the Threshold line come from north county Dublin, which includes the Tánaiste's constituency.

The Tánaiste and her Department must take major blame for the homelessness crisis. They are relying on the private sector to house council tenants and those waiting on homes. Between the Government and its Fianna Fáil predecessors, rent supplement has been cut by 28%. The top ups that we know most people must pay have gone up by 67%. That is through a combination of increasing the minimum amount a family must pay and reducing the maximum rent limits. Is it any wonder there are a million people on the breadline, which has been confirmed in surveys today?

The Tánaiste stated in 2012 that there would be no incidence of homelessness from rent supplement decreases. She actually said they were a positive move. Obviously, she is not going to listen to the Anti-Austerity Alliance and the housing action groups that are out there but for how long will she stubbornly ignore what housing agencies are telling her from the front line? Focus Ireland and Threshold categorically say that rent supplement is one of the immediate cases of the sharp rise in family homelessness. They have called the rent limits in Dublin a fiction. Some of these people are long-time members of the Labour Party so would the Taoiseach not listen to them?

While people wait for the Government's illusory houses, will it at least agree to put a bandage on the haemorrhage of homelessness? Number one, will it reverse the rent supplement cuts and revise the limits, particularly in Dublin where the crisis is most acute? Will it stop dithering and introduce rent controls, which are so obviously needed and are called for by all the agencies? There is nothing unconstitutional about them. Will it direct the banks to stop repossessions which result in evictions of families from their homes and instead agree to keep those families in their homes renting, which they would like to do? If the Government will not agree to do this, would it agree that the next step is what county managers are calling modular housing - shanty towns, container homes and prefabs?

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