Enda Kenny (Mayo, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

This is not acceptable at all. The Deputy asked the valid question as to how rents will come down. The answer is to deal with supply. The more houses one has, the less pressure there is on the housing stock whereby rents increase. The Government is committed to providing extensive student accommodation which every year takes up a couple of thousand spaces in apartments or other accommodation in the larger urban areas in particular.

The Government sees as an absolute priority the provision of social housing and private sector housing so that one can deal with the situation where so many people do not have access to housing and where one is required, by virtue of numbers, to bring in schemes that have helped over 10,000 people now to be able to stay in the accommodation that they are in by virtue of the housing assistance payments or the increased rent subsidy.

I take the point that the Deputy raises about the scale of rent levels in Dún Laoghaire or in other locations, particularly in Dublin, but this is an issue that is being discussed both by the Cabinet sub-committee and by the relevant Departments. Hopefully, all of that will come together in the action plan for housing, which I expect the Minister will be able to publish within the 100 days that he set out. It will take into account the question of the recommendations from the Oireachtas housing committee and from the other Departments and other people from around the country who have raised very practical suggestions as to how this particular challenge can be met. I hope that everybody working together can deal with this in the coming period. It will not happen in six months, but once one gets a stream coming through where houses are being built, where people know they are going to be accommodated, it provides the opportunity to deal with it once and for all.

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