Louise O'Reilly (Dublin Fingal, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

There is a cost-of-living crisis and it is hammering low- to middle-income workers. We keep saying it, but the Minister just cannot hear it, or he hears it and does not get it, or he does get it but is not interested in doing anything about it. The Minister needs to listen and to engage with the Opposition when we put forward solutions.

In my constituency of Dublin Fingal, workers are paying more than €2,000 a month to rent a three-bedroom property in which they are trying to bring up their families, pay the exorbitant cost of childcare and keep a car on the road because public transport is not quite what it should be in my area. All they see are prices rising all around them and a secure home getting further and further away from them. They see that is Government policy, which is working, because it appears to be policy to heap more and more pressure on the backs of ordinary workers until they simply cannot take it anymore.

I do not know what or who the Minister sees in his clinics.

In my clinics, every day of the week I meet people who are desperate for secure housing, which this Government is pushing further and further away from them. When I was young, the aspiration of owning a home was not fantastic. It was not a pipe dream. It was very achievable for people on ordinary incomes. That is not the case now. If that is not enough, this Government is ensuring that workers will continue to have to pay the high rents they are now paying, which means they cannot save for deposits and they are stuck renting. They cannot get out of the rental trap. Rents are going up week on week, year on year and it is crucifying them.

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