Pearse Doherty (Donegal, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

Inné, d'fhoilsigh an Rialtas tuarascáil an Choimisiúin Tithíochta, tuarascáil nach raibh sé sásta a fhoilsiú ach amháin go bhfuair RTÉ a chuid lámha air. Déanann sé cáineadh millteanach ar an Rialtas agus ar an méid atá déanta nó nach bhfuil déanta aige ó thaobh cúrsaí tithíochta agus an dóigh atá cúrsaí tithíochta á láimhseáil. Tá deis anois de dhíth faoi choinne an Dáil seo an tuarascáil seo a phlé go mion.

Last week, I asked the Tánaiste to tell me where the 50,000 affordable homes were that he promised to build at prices less than €250,000. He might remember that promise because he gave it himself. Like his party leader, he told the electorate in 2020 that if he was in government, he would deliver 50,000 homes that were genuinely affordable at prices between €160,000 and €250,000. Of course, the Tánaiste last week refused to answer that question. Of course he did because we cannot see any of those houses. None of them are there. Not one of those houses has been delivered by the Government. Instead, what he tried to do was to deflect from the Government's clear failure on housing delivery.

The Government might be able to dismiss the criticism of the Opposition, which it has been trying to do for quite some time, but it certainly cannot dismiss the damning criticism that has come from the Government's own Housing Commission. The commission's final report is a damning indictment of the Government's failure in respect of housing and particularly affordable housing. This is just some of what the report says. It mentions systemic failure, ineffective decision-making, reactive policymaking, all of which is undermining affordability. Just in case the Minister did not realise, that is him the report is talking about. I will put it in plain English. The Housing Commission concluded that the Minister, his decisions, his policy and the Government made rents go up and made houses more expensive. Sin é. Full stop. That is what it has concluded.

The report states that Ireland has the opportunity to change policy. I could not agree more. However, after 12 years of Fine Gael in government, supported in the main by Fianna Fáil through the majority of those years, change will not come from these parties that created the crisis. The only change that will come in housing is with a change in government. Of course, this report would never have seen the light of day if it had not been for the fact it was leaked to RTÉ. How do we know this? The Minister received the first report from the Housing Commission on the right to housing last August. For ten months, he sat on that report. Why? It is because the Government is deeply divided on the issue. Giving the stinging criticism of its failing housing plan in the commission's final report, I have no doubt the Minister would have done exactly the same thing to that report too. Thankfully, he has been forced to publish both reports in full.

However, the Minister's desperate attempt to spin the findings as an endorsement of his housing plan is not only dishonest but is also an insult to the hard work of that commission. It is not credible, as the Minister has tried to do, to claim the majority of the commission's recommendations are being progressed by the Government. Is he trying to suggest the commission did not know what it was talking about? Worse still, he is trying to bury both reports by referring them to the Housing Agency and an interdepartmental working group. He is running scared of an open debate on this issue and on the commission's findings. Is it any wonder, given what it has had to say regarding the Minister's record in housing.

Given the significance of the Housing Commission's findings, will the Government now schedule time next week to have an urgent and frank debate on the stinging criticism in that report? Does it accept the commission's findings on its ineffective decision-making and reactive policies that, in its words, are making the issues of affordability worse? While the Minister is on his feet, perhaps he will answer me, something his party leader could not do last week, on where the 50,000 affordable houses are that he personally gave a guarantee would be delivered if he got into government? He said 50,000 houses would be delivered at costs between €160,000 and €250,000. A week on and we cannot find any of them.

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