Richard Boyd Barrett (Dún Laoghaire, People Before Profit Alliance) | Oireachtas source

I can help Deputy Coppinger on that one. In response to a recent question, the Minister of State informed us that 1,700 housing units are to be built in 100 separate projects across all 31 local authorities by the end of 2017. To put that in context, in my area alone, 1,200 people joined the list last year. They are joining the list at a rate of 100 per month. The figures are the same elsewhere. Not only will that not deal with the crisis, but based on those figures, it will be ten times worse by the end of 2017.

In terms of Part V, the Minister of State says the Government estimates 4,000 additional units will be made available, although this is entirely conjectural because it is based on the private construction industry, over which we have no control and which even the European Commission says is not interested in building at the moment because it has a captive market in terms of buying up property that is already there and renting it out at massive prices. This is pathetic and I do not want to say that. For the sake of what I have to go through every Monday and Friday in my clinic and what so many others have to go through, I wish I could say there was something in this that gives me hope. People come in who are in absolute bits, faced with the possibility of homelessness. Landlords just announce they are putting up the rent and the tenants have nowhere to go. There is nowhere anywhere near the rent allowance caps and they just do not know what to do. They have been on the list for 18 years, they have kids who are sick and all the rest of it. I welcome the levy and the removal of the cash in lieu provision but it will not even come close to solving the problem and it will be counteracted by the renewed reliance on the private sector, which will make the problem worse.

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