Dáil debates

Tuesday, 10 May 2022

Affordable Housing: Motion [Private Members]

 

8:00 pm

Photo of Martin BrowneMartin Browne (Tipperary, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

The number of people who are either locked out of homeownership or even locked out of rental accommodation is genuinely staggering. Leaving the statistics aside for the moment, all Deputies know from the calls they get to their offices that there is a fundamental problem with the availability of accommodation. No family type is immune to this, be it families with young children, single parents with limited means or single people. We have heard sad and horrific stories from them all and have tried to assist them in a housing market that is out of their reach whether it is to rent or to purchase. It is awful to see people in this situation and it is appalling to know that the options to help them are extremely limited.

It is common sense to devise a plan that tackles the housing crisis from every angle, whether from a rental point of view or from a purchasing perspective. However, this Government does not think so. That is apparent from the affordable housing targets up to 2026. The Minister has the cheek to talk about narratives and the truth. He has failed, just like other Deputies on that side of the House who have been Ministers with responsibility for housing. According to the Daft.ie latest house price report, the average listing price in Tipperary increased year on year by 14.3%. These price hikes contribute to local authority housing lists which are creaking at the seams. At the same time, families are in hostels or sleeping on floors or sofas in the homes of friends or family members. Outrageously, Tipperary does not even feature in the Government's unambitious affordable housing targets up to 2026. This is at a time when the local authority is not only unable to provide accommodation for those on the lengthy housing list but is also struggling, and sometimes is unable, to provide emergency accommodation for those in need.

Thousands of euro are being spent weekly on getting emergency accommodation in bed and breakfast accommodation and hotels instead of providing councils with the capacity that I call for. The Government prefers this than to allow local authorities such as Tipperary County Council to access the affordable housing fund. We are calling for all local authorities to be allowed to access the affordable housing fund and to stop this practice of exclusion that destroys lives and severely affects families. The unambitious affordable purchase home targets must be revised to deliver an average of at least 4,000 affordablepurchase houses per year from 2022 to 2026. The Government must also stop contributing to the rising housing costs by scrapping the help-to-buy scheme and shared equity loan schemes, which push up prices, and divert the funding into the delivery of genuinely affordable houses. The chief priority is that the Government must learn that giving massive handouts to big developers to deliver overpriced houses never works because struggling home buyers and the taxpayer will always be the big losers in that situation.

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