Niamh Smyth (Cavan-Monaghan, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I congratulate my colleague, Deputy Darragh O'Brien, who has been very vocal and has led the campaign for housing. I am very disappointed to hear that the Minister of State and the Government will not support this legislation. The Bill is all about giving people a chance. This is about a generation that does not see an opportunity. Ten or 15 years ago they could buy their own homes and aspire to own their own home in their early 20s. We now see young people reaching middle age and still not being able to aspire to ever owning their own homes. This is a damning indictment of the Government.

The most current and common representation coming into the offices of every Deputy across the Chamber is housing, whether first-time buyers or social housing. The Minister of State said the needs of people in rural Ireland are different from those of people in urban Ireland. At the end of the day, people need homes, rural or urban. I am sorry to tell the Minister of State that in my constituency we have hundreds of people on our social housing waiting list.

On Monday I had the pleasure of attending the launch of a Rebuilding Ireland scheme in Monaghan, which I suppose was drawn out by Monaghan County Council. It was a scheme of 43 houses. That is welcome but does not come anywhere close to meeting the actual need. I hark back to the point that I still see our local authority housing departments not having the tools or the resources to be able to deliver schemes of hundreds of houses, which are what is needed. The Minister of State, Deputy English, was very welcome to County Cavan when he visited perhaps over a year ago. He launched Rebuilding Ireland schemes, including eight houses in Butler's Bridge and - I am taking a rough guess and being generous here - 20 houses in Ballyhaise. There were certainly no more than 20. The Minister, Deputy Humphreys, recently launched a scheme of 11 houses in Mullagh. These are small figures. I know that it is not that the Government is averse, but it really comes across that there is not a handle on this problem. It is the most important issue for this country. I am not sure a Minister needs to come to any constituency to cut a ribbon on a housing scheme of eight, 11 or 20 houses when in fact we need schemes of hundreds of houses.

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