Mary Lou McDonald (Dublin Central, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

We have had a housing crisis for more than a decade. It is a social catastrophe driven by the political choices made by Fine Gael and Fianna Fáil in that time. The situation is especially acute for our young people, for public services and for business. It is crystal clear that the Government does not appreciate the scale of the challenge. What is needed is a major step change from the Government to deal with the crisis. The measures the Taoiseach announced earlier today see Fine Gael and Fianna Fáil continue to tinker around the edges of this emergency. Their big idea is to hand private developers €1 billion in public money, with absolutely no detail. This is back-of-the-envelope, threadbare stuff. Worse still, there is no guarantee that it will deliver genuinely affordable homes to rent or buy. There is not one extra cent for local authorities or approved housing bodies.

Let me be very clear: we need private builders building homes that ordinary people can afford to buy, but Government overreliance on the private sector is not the answer. The answer to the housing crisis - the game-changing answer - is for the State to intervene directly to build thousands of homes on public land. What we need is for the Government to initiate a massive scaling up of affordable and social housing; what we get is a Government scrambling about, clutching at straws and trying to save a failed housing plan. It is doubling down on failure. Rents are extortionate, house prices are through the roof, and rising mortgage interest rates put the possibility of buying a home beyond the reach of so many first-time buyers. The only defining decision the Government has taken, at a time when people struggle to put a roof over their heads, is to have lift the eviction ban. It still cannot answer the question as to where are people to go.

I will tell the Taoiseach about one of those people, a woman with whom I am dealing directly. Her name is Jasmine Graham. She is a retail worker and the mother of two young children. The family have been evicted and now share one small bedroom in a bed and breakfast. She has searched desperately for an alternative place to live but to no avail. In fact, the council asked her if she had a car to sleep in. Jasmine's youngest child is four and half and has been waiting three years for a diagnosis of autism. He finds it really hard to cope in a cramped space. Her other son, who is nine, is suffering stomach pains as a result of anxiety. Jasmine says it is hard for her but that it is especially hard for the boys. She tries to stay strong for them. "I have no other choice", she says.

Inniu, feicimid an Rialtas ag athdhearbhú plean tithíochta atá teipthe. Seo an réiteach mícheart. Tá athrú ó bhonn ag teastáil. Ní mór don Stát idirghabháil a dhéanamh le méadú ollmhór ar thithe ar phraghas réasúnta agus tithíocht shóisialta a bhaint amach. The Taoiseach's decision to subsidise private developers to the tune of €1 billion is simply the wrong call. It will not solve the housing crisis. What does the Taoiseach say to Jasmine and the many families who cannot find a place to live? Where are they to go? When will Fine Gael and Fianna Fáil finally learn the lesson that what we need is a massive scaling up of affordable and social housing and the State to intervene to build thousands of homes on public land?

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