Róisín Shortall (Dublin North West, Social Democrats) | Oireachtas source

Basic courtesy aside, it would be helpful if the Minister listened to Deputies on this side.

One of the main requirements for the new committee will be to establish what exactly is holding back the supply of housing, both public and private. There are many theories and various reports have been compiled on the issue, many of which have been inconclusive. The various lobby groups also have ideas on the issue. The single most important task is to establish precisely what is holding back the supply of housing and what steps need to be taken to unlock housing supply.

We must also ensure a housing plan is drawn up for the immediate future because immediate solutions are required to solve the problem of hundreds of thousands of people being in housing difficulty. However, medium and long-term plans will also be required for the delivery of housing.

The committee must also agree on a number of principles, the first of which concerns the need to maximise the use of existing accommodation. A significant amount of accommodation is under-used. We need to adopt an evidence based approach and obtain expert advice on what are the best solutions in tackling the problem. I do not mean that we should seek advice from vested interests because too often they have dogged and controlled aspects of the debate on housing. We must ignore vested interests, speak to the experts and learn from best practice in other countries.

Another critical principle that needs to be established concerns the need for a social mix. While the Department has reasonably good guidelines on social mix, the Minister and the Department completely ignored them in recent years. It is critical that all future housing supplies have an adequate level of social mix because this is the only way to create sustainable housing developments. New estates must not be exclusively made up of either private or social housing. The 10% Part V social housing rule is set at much too low a level.

In my constituency we have the spectacle of the Department and the local authority effectively circumventing the planning process and national guidelines on social mix by providing funding for a voluntary housing association to buy up an entire new housing estate. This approach will not work.

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