Thomas Gould (Cork North-Central, Sinn Fein)

This Government says if the Opposition only brought forward solutions, it would listen and would implement them. What a load of hogwash. Here we have a solution and though the Minister of State might not agree with every part of it, it is a solution that is being brought forward in the same way that two weeks ago I brought a motion to the House to clear all the boarded-up vacant council houses owned by the State. The Government shot that down using the same amendment it is going to shoot this motion down with today. We have a housing emergency. People are crying out for help. The Opposition is trying to be constructive. We are trying to help the Government.

The Minister of State and I sat on the housing committee together and he listened at the same meetings. Why does he not work with us? It is because the Government is more interested in looking after speculator big landlord vulture funds while we are here fighting for the ordinary man and woman. I spoke to a couple yesterday and the woman told me she spent the weekend crying and could not go to work on Monday because she is, in her own words, "a broken woman". She cannot get on the social housing list because she is earning too much money. She is a professional and he is a tradesman. They cannot get cost rental because there is virtually none available in Cork. They cannot get affordable housing because in Cork €400,000 is being charged for that. They cannot get a mortgage to buy a house. They had a house picked out last week and they went in to put a bid on it. By the time they did, the price had gone up so high they were ruled out because they did not have the money, and she cried at the weekend. They told me they have an 11-month-old child and they will spend the summer deciding whether they are going to emigrate to Australia or Canada. That is what the Government is doing. It is driving young people out of the country because it is refusing to admit we have a housing emergency. I asked a simple question: where are the targets and where is Government's plan? The election was last year and it still does not have a plan. This is an absolute scandal. It is about time the Government did something because the people want houses and they want them now.

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