Ivana Bacik (Dublin Bay South, Labour) | Oireachtas source

It is some weeks since the budget but those locked out of securing housing are realising how little it does for them because house prices and rents are still going up and availability is not keeping pace with demand for homes. I know the Taoiseach will agree on this because we are all so aware of the chronic housing shortage and the impact it is having on so many people and communities. The Government's targets are too low and it is not even meeting its own targets for social and affordable housing. We have been promised revised upwards housing targets for many months but they still have not been published. Yesterday, Paul O'Donoghue wrote a very insightful piece in The Journal about the lack of an evidential basis for much of the housing policy the Government has introduced. He questioned the effectiveness of the housing assistance payment, HAP, the landlord tax relief and the help-to-buy scheme and pointed out that these schemes lack an evidential basis for successful outcomes. Does the Taoiseach concede that Housing for All has failed, that it is based on faulty policies and, in particular, that the targets need to be revised upwards to ensure increased supply? When will the Government publish those revised upwards targets?

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