Mick Wallace (Wexford, Independent) | Oireachtas source

When are we ever going to wake up and deal with our housing crisis?

Let us go back to the Jesuits and listen. We are not talking about a mad left-wing think tank. The Jesuit social policy officer, Margaret Burns, said only yesterday that we need to recognise that housing deprivation is one of the most serious forms of poverty in the Ireland of today and that in recent years the housing system has become the locusof some of the deepest inequality evident in our society.

Why is it not the number one priority of this Government to tackle one of the most shameful episodes that we can remember in how we run this State? If the Government needs permission from the Europeans to deal with it properly, such that we can borrow money at 1% to provide social and affordable housing to the people who need it, then I appeal to the Government to do it.

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