Matt Carthy (Cavan-Monaghan, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

The consequences of Government failures on housing are well rehearsed. We have record rents, record homelessness and house prices going up every month, pushing more and more families and workers to the point where homeownership is but a pipe dream. The clear reasons for this are the policies enacted by Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael, but some of the reasons are less evident. For example, some people are surprised to hear of towns and villages in Monaghan and Cavan and elsewhere where local developers have sites ready to go, plans in place, workers in place and customers on standby. They are willing - indeed, eager - to provide desperately needed homes for the local community but they are in deadlock, not because of the local authority, not because of any opposition, but because the local wastewater treatment plant is awaiting an upgrade and no development can happen until the upgrade is complete. One would imagine that a government that claims that housing is the social issue of this generation would be moving heaven and earth to sort this out. Not so, I am afraid.

To give an example, in the town of Kingscourt there is a huge demand for housing, both public and private. I am dealing with one developer with a plan to provide some of these houses but the wastewater plant needs an upgrade. When will it happen? Who knows. The local authority cannot tell the developer and Uisce Éireann, it seems, just will not tell. What Uisce Éireann does tell us, however, is that it needs a further €2 billion in capital funding in order to address the capacity issues in towns like Kingscourt. Unless the Government provides the funding needed, all its rhetoric on housing counts for nothing, all the protestations from Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael reps about individual plants in counties like Cavan and Monaghan count for nothing, and families in need of housing and local developers eager to provide it will continue to be left waiting. It is time for the Government to get its act together.

See this speech in context