Thomas Pringle (Donegal, Independent) | Oireachtas source

I thank the Ceann Comhairle for the opportunity to speak on this issue. There is no doubt that the social housing income level threshold is far too low. I have been raising this issue for some time now. Thankfully, the Minister has agreed to do something about it, although it is not enough. It is clear that the Minister has also recognised this issue at this late stage. He agreed earlier in the year to increase the social housing eligibility threshold by €5,000 in counties Carlow, Clare, Laois, Westmeath and Galway but has now extended that to across the country from January, which is welcome. It is obviously welcome because anything is better. If there is a disaster, having slightly less of a disaster is slightly better.

It is shocking. Every week and every month people come into my constituency office, people earning €32,000 or €33,000 a year with four or five kids, and I say to them they are never going to get on the housing list. They ask me what they are supposed to do. They can never get a mortgage. I tell them there is nothing they can do. I have to tell them there is nothing I, or anyone, can do for them. This Government does not want to know about them. That is the reality of the situation. Those people are suffering in that way all the time. A young family earning up to €50,000 or €60,000 a year will never get a mortgage and will never be able to buy a house the way things are at the minute. That is the reality of the situation.

I do not think there should be any income limits in respect of the housing list. Everybody should be able to be on it. Deputy McAuliffe said earlier that this was a very brave thing to do.

The reality is that the numbers on the housing list are used as a way of deciding how many houses are provided. The Government works in a bizarre way. It thinks that if the numbers are kept down artificially, it suggests there is not much need so it does not have to provide many houses. That is the reality of the situation. The more people get onto the housing list, the better because the bizarre way the Government and the Department think about the matter is that if more people are on the list, more houses must be provided. If more people are on housing lists, we might get to the point whereby we provide more houses. We do not want lists to be used as a way of controlling the delivery of houses. That is the reality of the situation. That is why it is there and exists. It is vital that we get to the point of having a decent and realistic list for people who cannot afford housing. The so-called market that the Government is in love with and enthralled by will not provide houses for those people. They are being left behind across the board. The point of any government or state is to step in and step up to the mark for those people. The Government has not done so. Its representatives can say anything they want about any Fianna Fáil Minister. Housing and public housing started to become run down in the 1980s and 1990s under the watch of Fianna Fáil. Fianna Fáil might not do it as quickly as Fine Gael but it will do it because that is what it has set out to do. That is the sad part about it.

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