Joan Collins (Dublin South Central, Independent) | Oireachtas source

Why would the Taoiseach not want more houses when he can give over to a developer public lands and have that developer potentially selling those homes in the private market for €420,000? This is public land.

It all sounds very good but the fact of the matter is the Government's policies on solving the housing crisis are simply not working. The dogs in the street know that the Government cannot solve the problem unless it engages in a major programme of public housing. We are in a housing emergency. We have debated time and again in this House the crisis that people are facing.

I had a young couple in yesterday. Living separately, they have a young son of three years of age. They are living separately because they are trying to save for a mortgage. They are finding it very difficult to do that. They cannot get private rented accommodation. It costs approximately €2,000 per month for a two-bedroom house in the area. They cannot afford a mortgage. They are still separated as a family because of that.

As the Taoiseach will be aware, there needs to be a major programme of public housing to solve the problem. The Government's plan is not working. We have sufficient public land to build 100,000 public housing units. There can be mixed tenure and mixed income with traditional public housing and the European cost rental model giving people affordable rents and long-term security. That is the mix we need. From my point of view, it is not an ideological issue. We need housing that people can afford and the Government is not providing it.

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