Lynn Ruane (Independent) | Oireachtas source

While I will focus mainly on student accommodation, on listening to the Minister's opening statement I will pick up on two points. As for Dolphin House and the regeneration, it is an area - around the canal communities - in which I have worked for a long time. I wish to recommend reading a book by a man named John Bissett on the failures of the public private partnerships, PPPs, in St. Michael's Estate, on the negative experience the community there had with the PPPs, on how many times they withdrew, and on how that community was completely torn apart and was obliged to move away. I note only a small number of those people remain there. The book outlines that experience and the Minister should ensure this does not happen again in either the areas about to undergo regeneration or those areas that were promised it, such as O'Devaney Gardens and St. Teresa's Gardens.

While I also welcome the Minister's comments on not being able to tell the difference between public and private housing, that is, between social and private housing, as someone who has lived in social housing I note that family make-up can determine where one lives and as a single mother of two children, it is a very negative experience. Given the make up of my family, I am expected to live in small accommodation on top of a family home but because another family does not have children of the same sex, it gets a bigger house with two floors, separate bedrooms for their children and a back garden. It is not good for the emotional and psychological well-being of the children in the family with same-sex children that they do not get to experience a garden or their own bedroom. When social housing construction is under way, housing for life should be considered and it should allow families to expand if they so wish, instead of being forced to live in small accommodation.

As a student, I welcome the recognition of the large and rapidly-expanding student population. It appears as though the Minister agrees that housing students is not simply an issue for higher level institutions and the construction industry but with regard to accommodation and city planning, is an issue that affects us all. As noted in the plan, a report drawn up by the Department of Education and Skills last year projected an increase in student numbers from 168,000 in 2014 to 193,000 in 2024. A large portion of these will congregate in the cities and large towns in already strained housing markets. Students and their families will once again struggle to cope with shortages of available beds, as well as uncontrollable rents and the uncertainties of an unregulated rent-a-room relief scheme. I call for a review of the rent-a-room scheme to provide more security for both tenant and landlord. During my time as a student union president in Trinity College, I saw at first hand the impact of the housing crisis on student welfare. It means skipping meals and classes to meet soaring rent costs and sometimes and it also means dropping out of university due to a complete lack of suitable accommodation. One way in which the provision of such accommodation can be achieved is by partnering with those being affected by the shortfall. This report recommends that the Government should work with the students themselves through the Union of Students in Ireland, USI. It is worth acknowledging this mature approach, which I believe will lead to a more sustainable solution that hopefully can prevent the current situation from recurring.

I have already mentioned this is not merely a student issue. Due to the nature of taking on a degree, most students are prevented from taking on full-time work. This puts them in the same approximate budgetary range as those receiving rent allowance, which means that in our competitive housing market, people are being pitted against one another for a dwindling pool of available accommodation. In addition, one must remember that in many cases where the cost of education is being supplemented by the family, the burden of unpredictable rents is being borne at home. This is a city planning and family issue and by providing purpose-built student accommodation, one takes students out of the rental market and opens up the rental sector for lower-income families, as well as those in emergency accommodation who need long-term solutions. While the report mentions the commitment of higher education institutions to provide several thousand units of purpose-built accommodation in the coming years, this will not match the projected increases in demand of more than 25,000 students by 2024. Some of this will be accounted for by developments through the private sector but one cannot be sure that this will cover the demand or produce affordable accommodation. Some of these private accommodation providers that will be in place for the new academic term - in just over a month - will charge rates of almost €850 per month for a single bedroom. The action plan commits to producing a student housing strategy in 2017. I welcome the intent to collaborate with the Department of Education and Skills and would like to draw attention to the point made in the plan that this must be done in conjunction with students themselves and with the city and county council. While a forward-thinking strategy would be a positive development, short-term action must also be taken. CAO results are only weeks away and it should be a serious concern for the Members of this House that students and their families will once again be taken advantage of while they are in a panic.

I will conclude because I am encroaching on Senator Dolan's time, but I have a couple of other points about NAMA and student accommodation which I will send on to the Minister