Mick Barry (Cork North Central, Solidarity) | Oireachtas source

Rents went up 14.6% in Cork county from the end of September 2020 to the end of September 2021, according to Daft.ie. Huge parts of Cork county are not designated as rent pressure zones, nor are they covered by any of the Government's rent controls. How can the Taoiseach justify this? When is he going to extend rent controls to the county as a whole and, more than that, to the country as a whole? Kerry and Clare had some of the highest rent increases.

Furthermore, how can the Taoiseach explain so many vacant local authority houses throughout the country in the middle of the worst housing crisis in the history of the State? How can he explain the fact there were 5,000 vacant local authority houses in the State at the start of the pandemic and 400-plus vacant local authority houses in Cork city at the end of the summer? Crucially, what does the Taoiseach intend to do about it?

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