Bríd Smith (Dublin South Central, People Before Profit Alliance) | Oireachtas source

The housing crisis is extreme and has not abated at all under the Taoiseach's watch. There are 8,313 households registered as homeless and another 62,000 families on the housing list. This is shocking, but just as shocking is the fact that there are 230,000 empty properties across the State. It is not that there is a lack of housing. Rather, there is bad housing policy. Not enough public housing is being built on public land and the rents and prices paid for housing are ridiculously high and unaffordable. The rent for an ordinary house in Dublin is €2,500 per month.

The Taoiseach may be aware that this situation is being exploited in our areas by far-right and fascist parties to blame immigrants rather than successive Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael Governments, including this one, and the bankers and fly-by-nights that we bailed out consistently. More than half of our health service is staffed by immigrants, yet the housing crisis is being exploited by those who claim that we must look after our own first. That begs the question of who our own are. Are they the one third of Deputies who are landlords? Are they the bankers and fly-by-nights that we bailed out consistently? Alternatively, are they the workers in our hospitals and home care settings who are doing so much to help us in the Covid era?

The housing crisis is being exploited, but the blame for its continuation can be laid at the doorstep of successive Governments. Instead of dealing with it, the Government is creating the LDA, which will basically give away public land to private operators and again fail to deal with the crisis.

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