Dáil debates

Tuesday, 10 May 2022

Affordable Housing: Motion [Private Members]

 

8:50 pm

Photo of Thomas PringleThomas Pringle (Donegal, Independent) | Oireachtas source

A Chathaoirligh, thank you for the opportunity to speak on this very important issue. I strongly support Sinn Féin’s motion and I thank it for bringing forward the issue of affordable housing today. Last week I spoke of the many people in this country who have been unable to secure rent and one would be right to wonder why so many have come to depend so heavily on the rental sector. The main reason that a growing section of people has been forced into renting is that it has been completely locked out of home ownership.

One now has a situation in this country where most people no longer have the option to buy but struggle to find and afford rent. I have come across more people stuck in the middle of this impossible dilemma than I care to count. There is a general feeling of hopelessness among my constituents and throughout the entire country because things only seem to be getting worse and sadly they are not wrong.

House prices are spiralling out of control and the market is showing no signs of slowing. In my constituency of Donegal the average house price jumped by €5,000 in the first three months of this year and in the three months previous to that it had risen by an average of €6,000. This represents a year-on-year increase of €25,000 in total.

The continued rise in prices has occurred across the entire housing market and has even occurred among older houses that would require considerable work, despite the continually increasing cost of construction and renovation these days. At the end of the fourth quarter last year there were 269 properties for sale in Donegal, which was a decrease of 10.3% over the quarter. There is no doubt that demand has far outstripped supply, especially in Letterkenny, as Letterkenny Institute of Technology, LYIT, attains technological university status.

There is also a demand for supply in areas affected by mica. One estate agent in Milford said that "the ongoing situation with defective blocks has hampered market activity for the more recently constructed properties, as continued uncertainty plagues the redress scheme".

I raised this issue with the Taoiseach earlier. I was very disappointed with his response. These families are faced with agonising uncertainty day after day. They were promised that legislation would be published at the start of this year. It is now May, but we have seen no movement on this aspect. It was also promised that the legislation would be published at Easter. That did not happen either. Moreover, we are now being told that the legislation will not undergo pre-legislative scrutiny. This is totally unacceptable. It is essential that important legislation like this is scrutinised properly. The Government cannot use the line of wanting to get legislation through quickly as an excuse not to engage in pre-legislative scrutiny. This Bill should have been prioritised. Mica has been an issue for a long time. Pre-legislative scrutiny should have been completed before the new year, with the aim of publishing the legislation at the start of 2022. There is no reason why this could not have been done, except for the lack of Government will.

Every month the legislation is delayed is another month of uncertainty for those families affected by mica and for the housing market in Donegal. Having to endure the mica crisis is bad enough, but having to endure the housing crisis on top of that is devastating for these families. I hope the Government remembers this as it continues to delay the legislation and decides to exclude important voices from the scrutiny process relating to it. I say that because members of a Mica Action Group would see through the legislation straight away and recognise if there were any problems with it. Perhaps that is the reason the legislation is not going for pre-legislative scrutiny. The Government tried to hoodwink the Mica Action Group in December when it made an announcement at 8 a.m. Within an hour, people from the group had torn that proposal apart and determined what was involved in it. I am afraid that is what is going to happen with this legislation as well.

I also support the call to scrap the help-to-buy scheme, as well as the first home affordable purchase shared equity scheme. It has been shown that these schemes serve only to push up prices and divert funding from delivering affordable homes. We should, instead, be significantly increasing our direct investment in the provision of genuinely affordable homes through local authorities and approved housing bodies. This would be a real and effective measure to tackle the housing situation. It seems, however, that the Government has no real interest in tackling this matter. The Minister has not fulfilled his promise to deliver affordable homes. This Government’s housing policies not only do nothing to help struggling people, but have actually further contributed to the housing crisis through schemes such as these, which have just created further inflation.

We have seen proof of this in the continued rise in prices and the stock of homes for sale falling to a historic low of just 11,300. The shortage of housing stock for sale or rental is most acute in the rural areas. Analysis has shown that house prices are now seven times average incomes. The Central Bank and the ESRI estimate that the mortgage lending rules have actually stopped house prices rising by an additional 10% to 25% over existing levels. This is not sustainable and we cannot continue in this way. Our citizens are asking for help and it is our job to do all in our power to help them. I urge the Government to consider the proposals in this motion. Its amendment to the motion is not good enough and is most certainly not ambitious enough. The Housing for All strategy is watery at best. Relying on this strategy to address the issues arising is not good enough and will never do anybody any good. To emphasise this point, in the amendment, the Minister quotes the Covid-19 pandemic as being one of the big problems with housing supply. He is probably disappointed that he is not in the Department of Health, because then he could blame the cyberattack as well. It has also been something of great benefit in explaining delays.

It is time we moved away from the failed housing policies of Fine Gael and Fianna Fáil and high time the members of this Government started listening to their constituents and to people on the ground who have been consistently saying that what the Government is doing is not working. It is time for a change. Implementing the proposals in this motion would be a positive step toward delivering that change. This is what is needed now.

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