Holly Cairns (Cork South West, Social Democrats) | Oireachtas source

This is the second vote of no confidence in the Government on the subject of housing in the past three months. In December there was a motion of no confidence in the Minister for Housing, Local Government and Heritage, Deputy Darragh O'Brien. Today there is a motion of no confidence in the Government. Both motions are inextricably linked to the housing disaster. Even if the Government survives the vote on this occasion, I expect there will be more motions of no confidence. Time is running out for the Government. The people it has failed on housing have had enough. They lost confidence a long time ago and it is not coming back. They have no confidence in the Government's ability to solve the housing disaster. They have no confidence in its plans and no confidence in its promises. They no longer even have confidence in its presentation of information, because every day we hear the same attempts to spin failure into success. Somehow weakness becomes tenacity. Delay becomes urgency. Defeat becomes victory. We saw the usual gaslighting again yesterday. Despite the Land Development Agency's failure to deliver a single home on State land in five years, the Taoiseach told me this would not have any impact on its overall targets. In fact, he stated that he is confident the agency will exceed its target. That target is 150,000 homes, and five years of the 20-year deadline have already elapsed. The Taoiseach expects us to believe that the Land Development Agency is sufficiently resourced and empowered to deliver more than 150,000 homes in 15 years. Is there anyone, even on the Government benches, who actually believes that? Does the Government expect the public to believe it? This is not a game, and everyone in here should stop for a moment and imagine what it is like for people looking at eviction to watch the shouting going on here this morning. It is not some kind of cheap three-card trick that can be played on people who are desperately looking for a home. They need more than sleights of hand or ever moving targets. The number of people enduring housing distress is growing every day. The impact this crisis is having on people's physical and mental health is absolutely devastating. Children are missing developmental targets as they grown up in emergency accommodation. The lives of adults in their 20s and 30s are on permanent hold because they cannot even move out of their childhood bedrooms. Once happy relationships are breaking down under the strain of housing insecurity. The stress of living with constant housing anxiety and fear for the future is debilitating and exhausting. More and more people are experiencing this trauma. There is no end in sight, and no hope for so many. We already have record numbers of people who are homeless. There are 11,754 people, including almost 3,500 children living in emergency accommodation now. That is a national scandal. However, we know that the official figures are a significant underestimate of the extent of the crisis. In reality, the situation is a lot worse. There are thousands more people who are sofa surfing, sleeping in their cars, or staying in overcrowded box rooms in their relatives' homes. I watched "Prime Time" recently. At just one viewing of one rental property on one day in Dublin, a reporter met two men who had been holding down jobs since last year while sleeping in their cars, one young mother who had been sleeping on friends’ couches for nearly a year and a mother whose entire family was about to be evicted as soon as the eviction ban is lifted. This nightmare situation is replicated across the capital and across the country.

This is why the Social Democrats have implored the government not to lift the eviction ban. It needs to just look around and see what is already happening. Why would it do something it is sure is going to make the situation significantly worse? Why would any Irish government vote to increase homelessness? The eviction ban is the only protection left that is stopping people from becoming homeless. However, the Government evidently does not seem to care. It is determined to plough on regardless, no matter what the cost in human misery and suffering. To add insult to injury, last week it announced some half-baked schemes which it optimistically described as a safety net for renters. This is just more gaslighting. None of these measures are in place. It is doubtful that some ever will be. Does anyone in government actually know how a safety net works? It is supposed to be in place before you fall. That part is critical. If it is not, and it does not catch you, then its functionally useless – like most of the Government’s so-called mitigation measures. The Green Party deserves special mention here. They have justified their support for lifting the eviction ban by stating tenants will soon have a first right of refusal to buy their home when the landlord sells it. Any such scheme would require legislation. That is something the Green Party leader seemed confused about after it had been announced. We have no idea when that legislation is likely to be published. Even if the legislation did exist, most tenants would not have a hope of being able to afford their rental homes.

In this instance, the Green Party did not seem to know house prices are at record highs. The decision of the Green Party is a Marie Antoinette moment. Let them eat cake is not the solution when the masses cannot even afford bread.

There are solutions to this crisis the Government could adopt if it were actually interested in addressing this disaster. There are more than 16,000 properties in the short-term letting sector, many of which would move to the long-term rental market if the existing regulations were enforced.

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