Leo Varadkar (Dublin West, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

People Before Profit's policy states that it is critical that we break immediately from the failed living-with-Covid strategy and implement a strategy based on elimination - the Chinese approach. This would have our economy in shutdown for a third Christmas. Construction sites would be abandoned and we would deprive people of their basic liberties for far too long. Fewer houses would have been built in the past year under People Before Profit, if any would have been built at all. I accept that a left-wing government would mean radical change; radical change for the worse for the vast majority of people. It would involve a self-defeating retreat from Europe and the world in pursuit of an ideological experiment that has brought misery and oppression to every country that has tried it.

I acknowledge that we have much more work to do, especially on housing, but the Government has helped our economy and society emerge strong from Brexit, Covid and the war in Ukraine. A record number of people are in work in Ireland at the moment. Trade and investment are at record levels. Notwithstanding inflation and rising incomes, we are generating budget surpluses due to prudent management of the public finances. We are using that money to help families and businesses with rising energy costs.

I know the Government needs to do much more on housing in the next two years. It needs to be a whole-of-government approach and it will be. It is a crisis that cuts across all age groups and one that demands results as well as actions. The no-confidence motion was heavy on analysis but light on solutions. There was not even one proposal as to how we could build houses more quickly. It is easy to invent slogans and raise targets but much harder to design and execute solutions. In Housing for All we have a plan that is thought through with a series of actions that complement one another.

We are providing grants to help people renovate old buildings and breathe new life into them, thus creating new homes in towns, villages and rural areas throughout the country. Well over 35,000 first-time buyers, singles and couples, have benefited from the help-to-buy scheme and we have extended the scheme for another two years. We are helping thousands of first-time buyers to bridge the gap between their deposit and the mortgage they can get, and the price of a new home through the first-home scheme. Some 16,000 individuals, couples and families have bought their first home in the past year. That is the highest in 15 years and we want it to be higher still. These people would not have been helped to buy if those in People Before Profit had their way. They want to take away the help-to-buy scheme and they do not believe in the first-home scheme. They want a State-sponsored rent-for-life model of housing, not one based on homeownership.

Our mission for the remainder of this Government is to turn the corner on housing for everyone - renters, first-time buyers, those experiencing homelessness and those in need of more suitable accommodation. Our mission is to restore the social contract and to make home ownership affordable for the many again. We will build more houses and apartments and get more people living in suitable, affordable accommodation. We will build even more social housing because it benefits everyone. It takes people off the housing list, frees up private rental properties for others and puts downward pressure on rents and house prices.

We should not forget that 8,000 or 9,000 new social homes will be provided this year, which could be the highest in one year in the history of our State. People hark back to the 1970s, 1980s, the 1920s, the 1940s and the 1960s, periods when they believe the State was building more social housing; that is not the case. Through local authorities, approved housing bodies and other mechanisms, we are providing more social housing than has been the case for a very long time. We will also scale up our cost-rental programme as the Minister, Deputy Eamon Ryan, mentioned.

I want to finish by paying tribute to the Minister, Deputy O’Brien. I know him since our days on Fingal County Council in the 2000s. We both got elected to this House in 2007 but I have only had the chance to work closely with him since 2020 when this Government was formed. I know him to be a tireless worker, pleasant and approachable, and always available to take a phone call. He is a good man, a man who cares, and a man who is doing everything he can to turn this situation around. He played an instrumental role in the programme for Government negotiations after the general election, helping to form this historic three-party coalition, while others in the Opposition barely even tried to put together an alternative and organised a range of public meetings instead. Tough as it is, Darragh did not hesitate in taking on the role of Minister for Housing, Local Government and Heritage and he, like all of us, has more to do. I know he will be undeterred by tonight’s motion and will be back at his desk this evening working on how we can shift the momentum on housing and help people through this difficult winter.

I commend this motion to the House.

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