Michael Collins (Cork South West, Independent) | Oireachtas source

Every weekend my clinics, like those of all Deputies, are full of people looking for help with housing, including families who work hard but will never be able to afford to purchase a home of their own and families who do not qualify for any State help. These are the people falling between the cracks. The Government's Housing for All plan is nothing more than a rebranding of old Fine Gael policies and does nothing constructive to tackle pressures in the rental market in the short term or to address longer term supply needs. It does absolutely nothing to tackle the exorbitant taxation charged on small Irish landlords. Instead, the policy favours only the large institutional investor model.

A functioning housing policy must include the following. All tenants should have access to a good quality, safe and secure home. All tenants should be able to treat their houses as their homes and be empowered to challenge poor practice. All landlords should have information on how to comply with their responsibilities and be able to repossess their properties when necessary. Landlords and tenants should be supported by a system that enables effective resolution of issues. Local councils should have strong and effective enforcement tools to crack down on poor practice. Councils must get back to the model of building social housing. That is not occurring on the ground.

More than half of households renting the home receive some form of State support. A recent ESRI report showed that almost 300,000 households received support for their housing costs in 2020, up from 134,000 in 1994. That works out at 16% of Irish households overall and 54% of all renters. That support comes in the form of a combination of HAP, RAS and rent supplements used to assist one in three supported renters today, compared with one in five in the early 1990s.

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