Seán Sherlock (Cork East, Labour) | Oireachtas source

I want to address three issues in the time afforded to me. First is the inspections regime of local authorities for private rented accommodation. I recently tabled a parliamentary question in which I asked how many inspections were carried out across all of the local authorities. The latest figures from Cork County Council, for example, show that from quarter 1 to quarter 3 of 2023, there were 1,447 inspections, from which 1,273 total improvement letters were issued. In comparison, in Dublin City Council, there were 5,449 inspections and 2,365 improvement letters issued. For me, the key is that, for people in private rented accommodation and where the landlord is the beneficiary of a State subsidy towards the cost of the rent, the standard of the accommodation needs to be improved. There is an onus on Government, as part of that review, to ensure tenants have proper rights regarding the standard of the accommodation they are living in. The evidence is there to show that the standard of accommodation, in some instances, is very poor and needs further improvement.

The second point relates to the number of vacancies throughout the country. Again, I will speak about my own county of Cork. Arising from the most recent census and some work the Simon Community has done, I note there are 17,000 vacant properties in Cork city and county alone. If that is not a scandal, I do not know what is. Why is it that we as a country and State cannot invest more energy to ensure that, if there are 17,000 vacant properties in a city and county, we can put people into those? It is beyond belief that, in 2024, there are 17,000 vacant properties in one county. We could all do a tour de table of our own native counties and I am sure the figures would be commensurate with the figures I am talking about here. If energy can be invested in that, we will go a long way.

The third issue is Irish Water. We cannot talk about a Housing for All policy if the very people who want to build houses spend an inordinate amount of their time toing and froing with Irish Water on capacity issues and constraints, particularly in wastewater treatment. Throughout the country, we as public representatives spend massive amounts of time mediating between people want to build houses and Irish Water on the issue of capacity. Unless Irish Water is adequately funded to build out capacity, especially on wastewater, the Minister is on a hiding to nothing with his house building targets. That is the sad reality. Until Irish Water can start funding the building out of capacity with more wastewater treatment plants, forget about building houses. I speak to very good, decent construction company representatives who tell me they are tearing their hair out because they cannot build houses in line with these targets because they spend too much time toing and froing with Irish Water. Fund Irish Water properly, build out the capacity, and then we will get the houses.

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