Ivana Bacik (Dublin Bay South, Labour)

The latest figures from the Department of housing show that, again, the Government will miss its targets for building social and affordable homes this year. It promised 10,000 new social homes and completed fewer than 2,000 in the first half of this year. The Minister for housing has boasted that more than 26,000 social homes are at various stages of design and construction. He had the temerity to describe this as indicating the Government's efforts to accelerate the delivery of social homes. However, remaining at the planning and design change is simply not good enough to put a roof over anyone's head this year. Look at the numbers of children, with 5,000 children homeless, and the numbers of families and people in homelessness, with so little available to people looking to find a home of their own - so little affordable to rent, so little to buy, and the tenant in situ scheme so ineffective for so many. When will we hear about the housing plan and the reality of the likely figure for the construction of social and affordable housing?

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