Dessie Ellis (Dublin North West, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

Increasing house prices along with high rents are proving a major road block for families, workers and those who want to get on the property ladder. We are in a housing emergency and this cannot be stated often enough. It is a man-made crisis perpetuated by successive Governments and their failed policies and ideologies. This Government is no exception. It is continuing to put forward failed policies and strategies. The Minister has put forward housing proposals which will not deliver social and affordable housing on the scale required or even houses that are affordable. The Government's view of what is affordable goes beyond what most couples on good incomes can actually afford to buy. The Minister's housing plans, which include schemes such as the shared equity scheme, lack ambition, will inflate house prices, increase personal debt and go against expert opinion. His proposals were strongly condemned as ill-conceived by housing associations, housing experts and economic organisations, yet they were robustly defended by local Fianna Fáil Deputies despite all the evidence to the contrary. Now, with the public backlash, these very same Fianna Fáil Deputies are imploring the Minister to revise his proposals. We need to get away on the reliance on private developers building social and affordable housing. The Minister's policies pander to the private sector and to the very vulture funds and similar which can avail of significant grants and tax exemptions, allowing them to buy up whole housing estates. In my constituency of Dublin North-West a company which bought a whole housing estate in Kildare is now buying up entire apartment blocks in Santry to rent them out. This is also happening in other areas of the constituency and every day I hear from my constituents of their frustrations as they try to get on the property ladder. Investment funds are driving up property prices and rents. Local authorities should be the drivers behind the building of social and affordable housing, not private developers. In my constituency, lands belonging to local authorities have been identified around Finglas, Ballymun, Whitehall and Santry where housing can be built at an affordable cost. The only winners from the Minister's proposals will be the investment funds and private developers and the losers will be the families and young couples looking for affordable housing.

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