Micheál Martin (Cork South Central, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

That sums it up. The legislation will be published next Tuesday, a week before the recess. This report relates to 2017 when 32% of calls to Threshold were from people being evicted, a figure that increased to 40% in the first half of 2018. The lack of urgency is incredible.

The Taoiseach mentioned all the apartments that are being built. I invite him to go around Dublin where thousands of student apartments are being built and rented out for €299 a week or whatever. I visited Greek Street two weeks ago and noted the contrast between Dublin City Council's apartments, St. Michan's, which are poor and substandard, and the juxtaposed luxury student apartments built next to the block, which will achieve a very high yield. That is fine. No one has a problem with it but it seems the greatest success story in housing right now is student apartments. That is not dealing with Maria's problem. She is living in a house of 12 people, including her mother and sisters.

The Taoiseach spoke about Christmas for 20,000 families. There are thousands more who will not have that Christmas experience. We can go through all the initiatives his Government has taken in the past two or three years which have not borne fruit. The rent pressure zones have not worked. That needs to be faced up to. The measure simply has not worked and it seems the loopholes in it have exacerbated the problem for many families and created a hidden homeless phenomenon, with many people going back to their parents' homes to living in overcrowded conditions. They are altogether separate from those who are actually homeless.

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