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

The Taoiseach did not answer my final question about the unaffordability of rent and accommodation and, therefore, I will try again. DCU students were protesting outside Leinster House earlier. They are being asked to swallow a 30% rent increase, bringing their rent up to almost €9,000 annually. This is because student accommodation was not covered by the Government's inadequate rent cap legislation. Will the Taoiseach do something for the DCU students and other students who will be unable to continue their studies if they are asked to swallow these rent increases? Does he accept that a 4% rent cap is ineffective? Even the imposition of criminal sanction in the legislation mooted earlier by the Minister would be a futile, half-baked exercise in closing the door after the horse has bolted because the problem is rents are unaffordable. Will the Taoiseach please address this point? There is no point limiting average rents of between €1,800 and €2,000 in Dublin to a 4% annual increase. Rents need to be reduced to affordable levels. These average rents equate to 70% of the income of the average worker. That is not sustainable or payable. I mentioned the young student nurse who wrote an open letter to the Minister for Health about how nurses are going home at the end of the week in tears because they only have between €4 and €6 left in their pocket after they have paid their rent. I ask in all insincerity what the Taoiseach will do about that. If all the Government is promising is to limit unaffordable rents to 4% annual increase, that is a complete waste of time.

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