Mary Lou McDonald (Dublin Central, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

The lack of affordable and secure homes is the biggest problem facing our people for the past decade. We have a generation whose lives have been defined by this housing crisis. When the Taoiseach came to power six months ago, he said that his Government would be the Government to sort out housing, but that promise has fallen flat. Rents remain sky-high, houses remain unaffordable and the council waiting lists still heave with applicants waiting for years on end. At the sharpest end of this crisis, the number of people using homeless services has increased. We know that the true level of those experiencing homelessness is at least 20% greater than official Government figures would show.

We are facing into 2021 and people are asking where the ambition is. Where is the sense of purpose from the Government to fix housing? Where is its sense of urgency to change the direction and to turn the tide of this crisis? People do not see it because it is not there. Ordinary people are paying the price. They pay it by forking out obscene rents to landlords, by living in the box room of their parents' house, and by still not being able to afford a deposit despite saving every single available euro. Far from fixing housing, the Government is making the same mistakes that got us into this mess in the first place and it is doing it with its eyes wide open. It is making mistakes that will ensure more children call a bed and breakfast home, more families face the prospect of homelessness and more young people will give up on ever owning their own home. The Government's lack of ambition was seen again on Monday when the Minister for Housing, Local Government and Heritage, Deputy Darragh O'Brien, re-announced his cost rental plan. A total of 350 units was the best he could do, 50 fewer than promised in the budget. Meanwhile, the Government persists with its belief that €380,000 is affordable for a three-bedroom house.

It is not enough just to build houses; we have to build houses that people can really afford. The Taoiseach seems to have serious trouble understanding what actually is affordable for ordinary workers. That is because his idea of affordability is linked not to public need for decent housing but to the need for profit. I think he is afraid to do the right thing because he does not want to upset developers and landlords. We only have to look at the fact that the direct spend on affordable housing by local authorities and approved housing bodies in 2021 will be a miserable €35 million. Meanwhile, the Government puts €1 billion into the pockets of landlords by subsidising social housing tenants in the rental market. The Taoiseach is truly in an ideological cul-de-sac. At the centre of the Government's housing failure is the absence of its long-promised affordable housing plan. The Minister, Deputy Darragh O'Brien, first promised that the plan would be published in September. Then it was promised for after the budget. Then it was promised for some time in the autumn. Now the Minister is saying he will bring this plan forward to the Government soon, whatever that means.

That is not good enough. People now are crying out for action. Fianna Fáil had four years to prepare for the housing Ministry. A group of officials in the Department of Housing, Local Government and Heritage has been working on an affordable housing policy for two years. The Taoiseach has been in charge for six months. My question is clear, it is simple and it is this: where is that affordable housing plan?

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