Maureen O'Sullivan (Dublin Central, Independent) | Oireachtas source

"Alarming", "disturbing" and "frightening" are the three words I would use to describe the housing issue. While there is no doubt that the posltion is getting worse outside Dublin, it is in Dublin where the most severe difficulties are being experienced when it comes to housing and homelessness. We know the facts. We know that more than 700 families and 1,500 children are homeless. We know that the local authority housing list runs to over 140,000. We know about spiralling rents and the rigid and restrictive Central Bank mortgage lending rates.

I want to mention specific problems I come across every day, one of which concerns those in recovery from addiction. That recovery is being jeopardised because there is not enough drug free accommodation available. I have listened to what is happening in London, in particular, in one project. A whole building was made available to provide homeless accommodation for those who had difficult and chaotic lives, but there was one floor for those who wanted to become drug free. There were detox facilities with medical care. The difference this made to people in getting out of these chaotic lives was unbelievable. Long-term tenants in their 50s who have consistently paid their rent are facing eviction. People are sharing rooms as opposed to houses and flats. There are people on reasonably good incomes who will never get a mortgage. People are working to pay rent rather than earn a living. A single man in his 30s on a local authority housing list will more than likely be eligible for senior citizen accommodation before there will be a move on the local authority list. Foreign nationals are presenting to homeless services and being moved through pathway accommodation because they are foreign nationals. That is not represented in the true figure for those who are homeless.

Successive Governments took their eye of the ball when it came to housing. They ignored the reports and statistics which indicated that there would be a crisis. We are aware of the over-reliance on private developers and the way in which there was light touch regulation. We know that local authorities stopped building and that landlords had the power to raise rents at will. I have sympathy for landlords who deal with tenants from hell, but more and more I see the other type of landlord who uses whatever means are at his or her disposal to evict tenants and, of course, the banks facilitate this. Whatever about banks moving against the owner of a property, it is the tenant who suffers the consequences.

On the boarding up of voids during the recession, the local authorities bore the costs. I acknowledge that Dublin City Council has been moving much quicker on the issue. Some sensible solutions have been proposed in the motion tabled by Deputies Ruth Coppinger, Joe Higgins and Catherine Murphy. A reasonable proposal is that during a housing crisis there be a halt to economic evictions and repossessions, especially where there is no alternative accommodation available for the tenant. It is heartbreaking listening to people who know that they are facing eviction, particularly for those of advancing years. Landlords have been unscrupulous in trying to get rid of tenants because it is a landlord's market and they can find tenants who will pay more. If there is not going to be a total ban, the meassure could be in place for a much longer period of six to nine months.

There is a need for the banks to differentiate in the way in which they treat people where a house is their home as opposed to those people who have houses as part of a property portfolio. I am opposed to giving more in rent to landlords for substandard accommodation. The reality has to be faced that rent supplement is not in keeping with market rents. The rent allowance for a single man is €520, for which one will not find one bedroom accommodation in Dublin, although I am not sure what the position is outside Dublin. What is happening is that young people are paying between €200 and €300 to share a room with two or three others. It is no secret that people are topping up on their rent allowance. Why not look at the consumer price index as a much better way to gauge fairness?

Some weeks ago we had a debate on tax justice and corporate tax. Social Justice Ireland states a 6.5% effective tax rate would bring in an additional €1 billion. We have only to look at NAMA and the number of hotel rooms it has in its control. It is sensible and practical that it should give a certain number of rooms in hotels for those in homeless accommodation. I have been speaking ad infinitum about Moore Street which was a street on which people lived and which is in the control of NAMA. Why cannot it gift that street to the State when we could have a proper restoration to provide housing for people? There is a scheme of improvement works in lieu of local authority housing which could be looked at. There are people living in overcrowded accommodation who have space to add an extension. If there were grants to provide these extensions, the people concerned would be taken off the housing list.

Local authorities have to be able to engage with people before they become homeless, not when they are homeless and in crisis. The rent certainty introduced has been welcomed by those working with the homeless. If it had been provided overnight without much debate or discussion by way of emergency legislation, landlords would not have had the opportunity to increase their rents. There was a crisis this time last year and it is still a crisis, but it is not being acknowledged for what it is.

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