Catherine Martin (Dublin Rathdown, Green Party) | Oireachtas source

I am sharing my time with Deputy Eamon Ryan. We have still not received a copy of the Minister of State's speech even though many Members requested it at the beginning of the debate.

Once again we debate in this Dáil this Government's most tragic failure - its ongoing inability to deal with an unprecedented housing and homelessness crisis. There are today more than 9,000 people homeless in the State. More than 3,000 of those are children. The numbers suffering on our streets and in emergency accommodation are only going up. The Government, in its isolated wisdom, feels it can tackle the crisis by, among other revolutionary, ground-breaking initiatives, granting tax breaks to developers and paying hundreds of millions of euro to private landlords in rent assistance without requiring fair fixity of tenure for tenants, let alone improving rental living standards and conditions. Where is the equity in all this? These initiatives are not working. It is certainly the definition of futility that the Government continually adopts the same methods and narrow-minded approach time and again to fix the crisis as the numbers of individuals, families and children who become homeless continue to grow. The Government simply does not have the vision or strategy to deal with this crisis. Every day, more people are suffering as a consequence. The Government's approach is not working. We need immediate, effective action. We need new ideas and new thinking outside the box, and then we need to implement the new proposals, not the same old, same old.

The Green Party motion calls on the Government to tackle one of the foremost and fundamental challenges associated with our housing crisis, housing supply, by taking the responsibility to build more houses into its own hands. The motion provides a clear and practical model for doing so, one that is used in many other European countries. The State needs public rental housing stock of its own to ward off the problems that the private-market, subsidies-oriented approach brings with it. Public cost-rental housing provides security of tenure and affordable rents for tenants of all incomes. We can build these houses off-balance sheet, borrowing against future rental income. This is an investment in our future, our children and our children's families.

The 34 acres of land at the site of the Central Mental Hospital in Dundrum, which is in my constituency, Dublin Rathdown, will be perfect for an affordable, State-owned, cost-rental alternative for families who are priced out of the areas in which they grew up. This is once the facility is relocated to Portrane. House prices in my constituency have doubled in the past six years. We are identifying effective, identifiable and practical steps that the Government needs to take. I urge every Deputy in the House to support our motion. I urge the Government to take these ideas to heart and do so with the appropriately extreme sense of urgency needed.

Mar a léirigh mo chomhghleacaí, an Teachta Eamon Ryan, roimhe seo, táimid ag moladh sa rún seo go dtógfar tithe agus árasáin d'ardchaighdeán ar thalún an Stáit ionas go mbeidh daoine in ann cíos réasúnta réalaíoch a íoc le haghaidh a gcuid lóistín. Tá a macasamhail á dhéanamh faoi láthair sa Danmhairg, san Ostair agus san Ollainn. Níl fáth ar bith nach féidir linn é seo a dhéanamh in Éirinn. If the Government is truly honest about this issue, it will admit that its approach is not working. It has been adopting it for seven years and it is not working.

I appreciate that the Minister, Deputy Eoghan Murphy, has not been in his portfolio for seven years but the Government has. The approach has not been markedly different since the Minister took office. Therefore, in order to make progress on and ultimately resolve the problem once and for all, the Government must first wake up, be very candid and accept its approach is not working. The statistics speak for themselves. For how much longer, over a prolonged period, must the Government insist upon continuing to implement failed policy - a tried, tested and failed policy? This is not a vanity project and it is not about who is right or wrong. The overarching concern - the only concern - is to tackle this unprecedented crisis head on.

The National Economic and Social Council is recommending the cost-rental approach. The Nevin Economic Research Institute is recommending this approach. Social Justice Ireland is recommending this approach. Will the Government admit a new approach is needed, follow the experts, take on board the view of the stakeholders and abandon, here and now, not just a failing policy, but also a failed response? All the Deputies in this House want a constructive solution to our housing crisis. For that to happen, the Government first needs to realise it must change its approach. It needs to change its way of thinking. Our cost-rental motion is a start in that regard. I urge every Deputy to support it.

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