Richard Boyd Barrett (Dún Laoghaire, People Before Profit Alliance) | Oireachtas source

It seems to me that the most elementary function of a government in order to have a functioning economy is that its citizens can exist in that economy at the most basic level. Students from Dublin City University, DCU, gathered outside Leinster House today because they have been asked to suffer an increase in rent from €4,500 per year to €8,700. For many that means they will leave education.

An open letter was written today by a student nurse who is leaving nursing studies because after paying for her accommodation and her bills she has €4 a week left to live on. Even somebody on average industrial earnings is paying 70% of their income to meet average rents, which are now between €1,800 and €2,000 in Dublin city.

Does the Taoiseach recognise that if students, people on low income, nurses and a vast number of our citizens cannot put a roof over their heads we have a serious economic problem? Does he recognise how serious the problem is? Talking about limiting rent increases to 4% against that background is worse than useless, a futile exercise in closing the stable door after the horse has bolted. Does he not need serious emergency measures to bring the cost of accommodation down to a level where people can exist?

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