Derek Nolan (Galway West, Labour) | Oireachtas source

I thank the Minister of State for taking my Topical Issue. My remarks are addressed not personally to the Minister of State, but to the Minister of State, Deputy Coffey, the Minister, Deputy Kelly, and the Minister for Finance, Deputy Noonan, as the people who brought forward the new housing package on stabilising rents and boosting supply this week. The package includes a number of good measures which people can rightly welcome, such as the extended period for rent reviews, longer notice of rent reviews and the increased role of the Private Residential Tenancies Board, PRTB, in giving tenants extra certainty, challenging rent increases and providing oversight for landlords and tenants. The measures will help Galway.

During the boom, Galway city did not create vast ghost estates or overbuild. Rather, the authorities there were careful and cautious. As a result, when the downturn happened, we had one small ghost estate, the position in respect of which was remedied quickly thanks to the then Minister with responsibility for housing, Deputy Jan O’Sullivan, who secured funding for it. However, this means that as the economy has improved, the housing shortage in Galway has been particularly significant. Rent for a three-bed semi-detached house increased from €800 per month in 2011 to €1,200 per month at present, a 50% increase in some cases. The level of increase has been even higher in some parts of the city. Houses that were selling for €160,000 or €180,000 are now being sold for €220,000 to €240,000, which is a staggering increase. During the past four to five years, a maximum of 240 houses have been built in Galway city. Many of them were one-off projects built by people with sites. There is no serious housing construction of any kind, with the exception of one or two properties being developed by NAMA.

I had hoped the report would contain ambitious measures for an increase in housing supply in Galway, bearing in mind that last year's Housing Agency report on housing supply requirements in Ireland stated that between 2015 and 2018, Galway city would require an additional 2,300 units in order to keep up with demand and prevent a crisis. We have already reached crisis point but this number of units would ameliorate the position by increasing supply. The document published this week, to much fanfare, acknowledges that "a major contributing factor to the current rental crisis is the lack of sufficient construction activity in the Dublin and Cork regions". While I will not deny there is insufficient construction activity in the Dublin and Cork regions, there is also a severe lack of construction - indeed a total absence of construction - in Galway city.

Galway is not a rural town in the west. It is, rather, a regional capital which deserves to be treated like the serious urban centre it is. It is the regional capital of the west and has the same problems in respect of housing construction and supply as Dublin and Cork. If the Department is waiting for Galway to reach the same crisis point as Dublin, this is the way to go. If it wants to have some kind of long-term vision, it must realise that we already have 12 families per week presenting as homeless and major supply problems. The bias in the social housing programme towards Cork and Dublin is already evident. It is unacceptable that the third largest city in Ireland should be excluded from measures to increase housing supply while Dublin and Cork are treated as the only urban areas, and I want it changed.

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