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

The latest daft.ierental report makes for very bleak reading. It will bring no comfort to tenants who hand over an extortionate amount of their earnings to landlords every month and it again highlights the abject failure of the Government to get to grips with this crisis. Rents, already at record levels, increased by a further 7% in the past year. The average rent has more than doubled in a decade, increasing every year for the past nine years. It now stands at €1,516 per month. It is off the wall.

While rents in Dublin continue to soar to an astonishing average of €2,082, the real punch in the gut in this report is the massive jump in rents people in the regions now face. Rents in Munster are up by 15.6%. In Connacht-Uladh, people in Mayo, Leitrim and Roscommon have been hit by a 20% hike. A bad situation has gotten even worse on the Taoiseach's watch and that of a Fianna Fáil Minister for Housing, Local Government and Heritage. Fianna Fáil has picked up right where its Fine Gael partners left off. The party's refusal to take urgent action means this crisis has become a generational catastrophe.

Workers, families and young people cannot afford these rents. They do not stand a chance of saving a deposit to buy their own home. Renters are hanging on now by a thread. Why? This is happening because the Government recycles policies that favour developers, wealthy investors and big landlords over ordinary people. We need only look at what it is dong. The Minister, Deputy Darragh O'Brien, has given landlords the green light to increase rents even further in the midst of this crisis. The Government bends over backwards with sweetheart tax deals and roadshows for cuckoo funds that drive rents through the roof and, by the way, pay no tax on their rental income. The Government did nothing in its budget to help renters. These are the choices it has made and renters are now paying a very heavy price.

There are alternatives that would make a big difference.

Sinn Féin has asked the Taoiseach time and again to cut rents by putting one month's rent back into renters' pockets through a tax credit. He said no. We asked him to ban rent increases for three years. He said no. Now, here we are, with renters staring into the abyss and their lives on hold and aspirations curtailed, unable to plan for the future because many of them do not know whether they will make it to the end of the month. That is the reality and it must change. If the Taoiseach does not show up for renters today, he never will. Tá an ghéarchéim cíosa ina tubaiste faoi deara. Tá mé ag impí air an treo a athrú. Ní mór gníomhú práinneach a dhéanamh chun cíosanna a ghearradh agus cosc a chur ar mhéaduithe cíosa i gcomhair trí bliana. I ask the Taoiseach to act. I ask him to cut rents and ban rent increases for three years. I ask him to do both of these things urgently. No more blah blah blah, kicking for touch or talking down the clock. I ask him to show up and give renters the break they need or make way for a Government that will.

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