Pearse Doherty (Donegal, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

I do not think Deputy O'Donnell has tabled an amendment relating to his proposal, but I hear what he is saying with regard to targeting support for those trying to get on the property ladder and having a detailed review of the matter. I again put it to the Minister that he has carried out a detailed review in this regard. The review has shown there is substantial dead weight in the help-to-buy scheme. Was it 52% of individuals who benefited from the help-to-buy scheme who did not need its support to get onto the property ladder? That is different from what Deputy O'Donnell is talking about, which is people who genuinely cannot afford to purchase a house. The cost of the dead weight is more than €100 million. In the mouth of a housing crisis, it is not the right use of State resources, particularly when there is evidence that this is pushing up house prices.

We continually hear about how the help-to-buy scheme has benefited X number of individuals but what the Government does not say is that more than half of those individuals did not need that scheme to purchase their home. They had a deposit in excess of what the macroprudential rules lay down for their category.

There is a serious issue here. The report requested that the Minister look at the loan-to-value ratio; he has not done so. The report also requested other changes. There is a real issue here, as I said on Committee Stage, in that he and his party has driven policy on housing that has been an almighty disaster for people the length and breadth of this State. On Committee Stage, I told him that this was not just an issue anymore of people trying to afford to purchase their own home, or whether they could keep a roof over their heads when they were renting from their landlord. This crisis, catastrophe, disaster and emergency has now spread right across different facets. Since Committee Stage, we have heard six different teachers' unions come out very clearly on the Government's policy and the fact that it is now affecting the education sector being able to attract teachers. We also hear that in respect of the health sector. It is not just those areas but others as well.

It is clear that Fine Gael lives in some type of deluded bubble, when we hear the Tánaiste talk about the grass not always being greener on the other side and things are just as bad in other areas as they are here. I urge Fine Gael, as a party that is now in its twelfth year of government, as one of the architects of this crisis and as a party that has pursued policies, even if it did not know about it at the time and forgetting that the Opposition told the party this would have the consequences it would, to acknowledge the evidence is now clear. There is nowhere whatsoever to hide. Fine Gael's policies have collectively pushed up house prices to the highest level they have ever been in the history of the State. Its policies collectively over the past 12 years have resulted in a social nightmare, where 11,000 people are in emergency accommodation and where this Friday, my children and children throughout the State will look forward to "The Late Late Toy Show", but others will be in hotel rooms and emergency accommodation wondering how Santa Claus will visit them this year, maybe not for the first time in emergency accommodation. Others will enter that system because of the policies of Fine Gael.

Rents went up 20%, which is crazy stuff, and 19% in County Donegal in the past year, yet, if we listen to Fine Gael and Fianna Fáil, they swear they are doing a good job. If the intention is to create the largest number of homeless people, the largest house prices, the largest rent increases, or the largest rents we have ever seen then, fair play boys, the Government has nailed it out of the park, but that is not we should be doing. The help-to-buy scheme is a measure that is being brought in because of the desperation of so many people who cannot afford a house. Anybody who cannot afford a house and is offered €30,000 in State money will, of course, grab it with both hands. Why would they not? That money means there is possibly a light at the end of the tunnel for them but the problem is it drives up house prices. When the amount is increased, a finite number of houses are being chased at the end of the day.

We see that is the case with this scheme, in addition to the advice from numerous other individuals, including Secretaries General and external organisations funded by the State, which are telling the Government that some of its schemes are pushing up house prices, the shared equity scheme being another of them. That is the consequence of it and the Government cannot hide from that. It cannot hide from that anymore. That is why I have a serious issue with the fact that the Government is not dealing properly and sufficiently with the source of the problem. Indeed, by trying to remedy this and to recognise that so many people are locked out of homeownership, which has fallen under Fine Gael, and by introducing this scheme, which is so short term, the Government is having an impact on affordability across the board.

What we needed to do for many years, and what we still need to do, is to aim for far more ambitious targets on social, affordable and cost-rental housing. We need to cut the red tape for the delivery of housing, from the Department right through to all the different steps that are in place. I can bring the Minister to within 10 km of my home in west Donegal where one of the biggest issues I now face and deal with as an elected representative, which I never ever dreamed of living in a rural constituency, is so many people who face homelessness. I never thought in my life that would happen nor did the people who come to me. They thought it was an issue that affected people in the inner cities of Dublin and maybe Cork, not rural west Donegal, the heart of the Gaeltacht or elsewhere. It is now the reality for many families, most of whom hold down full-time jobs. The reality is we have to get to grips with this.

We need to drive forward - I am sure the Government will say it is doing this - the delivery of social, affordable and cost-rental houses to deal with the housing crisis. The Government cannot hide from the fact we have the highest house prices, highest rents and, shamefully, the highest number of homeless people in the history of the State. We see all the other indicators. The Minister appeared before us at the finance committee to tell us that commencements were going in the right direction. This is the deluded bubble Fine Gael lives in where it swallows its own spin and propaganda. Commencements have been falling for the past seven months. Over a 12-month period, commencements are down by approximately 8,000 compared to where they were seven months ago. There is a serious issue with the pipeline. The Government needs to wake up to the reality because so many people and families are suffering as a result of the disastrous policies it has introduced year after year in these type of finance Bills. Members of the Government stand there, think they know all the answers and all the rest, refuse to listen to the Opposition and, as a result, they have created a situation in this country that was completely and utterly avoidable. Now is the time to do the right thing.

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