Pearse Doherty (Donegal, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

Níl dabht ar bith ann ach go bhfuil an ghéarchéim tithíochta ag dul in olcas lá i ndiaidh lae. Tá níos mó daoine óga anois ag maireachtáil sa bhaile lena dtuismitheoirí nó ag dul ar imirce thar sáile. Tá teip iomlán ar phlean tithíochta an Rialtais. Ní thabharfaidh ach athrú Rialtais dóchas do dhaoine go dtiocfaidh deireadh leis an ngéarchéim tithíochta.

The housing crisis is worsening every day that this Government is in office. More and more young people now are being forced to live at home with their parents well into their 30s or take the choice to emigrate. More and more working people, as they get closer to retirement, are being locked into an insecure and overpriced rental market and they are fearful for their future.

We were contacted by one person who has a good job at a Dublin hospital. She is in her 30s and on a good salary, but she cannot find a single place to live that is somewhat even reasonable. Most of the apartments in the area are nearly €2,000 per month and that does not include the bills. This person tells us that she feels completely hopeless. She says the situation she and so many of her generation face has been created by successive Governments allowing the few to profit off her generation and lock them out of any sense of stability, and I completely agree with her. This Government is failing to deliver the genuine affordable homes working people need.

It is widely acknowledged that the Government's housing targets are far too low and wholly inadequate to meet the need of the actual demand of housing right across this State. Yet despite all of this, the Government refused to increase housing investment above these inadequate targets in the recent budget. Each year, the Government has failed to even reach those targets.

The Tánaiste keeps telling us that the Government has the most comprehensive housing plan in the history of the State and that it is spending more and more money on social and affordable homes than ever before yet when we look deep into the facts, the reality is very different. This year, €4 billion was to be spent to deliver 14,500 social and genuinely affordable homes. However, today we learned that at the end of September, less than half less of this allocation has been spent. So, what does this mean? It means that thousands of affordable homes for working people promised by this Government will not be delivered this year, just like last year, the year before and the year before that. In fact, figures from the Minister for Housing, Local Government and Heritage show just how bad this Government is doing. By June of this year, only 15% of the social homes that were promised had been delivered and only 123 out of the 4,400 affordable homes that were promised had been delivered, and not a single affordable home was delivered by the Land Development Agency.

If the Tánaiste wants to figure out why house prices and rents are rising, then this is the reason. This is why house prices and rents are rising. This is why homelessness is rising. This is why people feel hopeless, like that woman who works in a Dublin hospital and cannot find anywhere to live. This is why the Government's plan is failing. The housing targets need to be increased. It needs to start with the delivery of 21,000 social and genuinely affordable homes next year. The expenditure ceilings for housing delivery need to be increased and the red tape needs to be cut to ensure local authorities and approved housing bodies can deliver homes at pace and at scale. The response from the Government needs to meet the scale of the emergency that is right across this State. Will the Tánaiste finally accept that the Government's plan is failing? It is failing the worker in that Dublin hospital and the people who are in Dublin Airport at this minute. It is failing people in emergency accommodation and those who are locked out of homeownership and locked into extortionate rents. Will the Tánaiste finally acknowledge that it is failing and turn course?

See this speech in context