Lynn Boylan (Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

I raise the latest daft.ieand myhome.iehouse price reports released today because they made for very depressing reading. House prices have increased by 13% in the past year with people now paying an average €34,000 more for a home than last year. In Dublin, average prices now range from between €350,000 and €600,000. Of course, Covid has had some impact on supply but Government policy is also to blame. The help-to-buy scheme fuelled house-price inflation and the proposed shared equity scheme will simply add fuel to the fire. At the weekend we discovered that even the Minister for Housing, Local Government and Heritage's officials had warned against the shared equity scheme but he is ploughing ahead regardless. The Minister should come here and explain why, despite the warnings from all of the experts, he is arrogantly insisting on proceeding with the scheme.

The Minister also needs to tell the House how he will ensure that the houses on the Poolbeg site will be genuinely affordable. The National Asset Management Agency offered that land to the previous housing Minister, Eoghan Murphy, at a 50% discount. However, even when it would benefit his constituents, Mr. Murphy refused the offer. Instead, Ronan Group Real Estate purchased the site at a price significantly higher than the guide price. He is planning to build even more unaffordable build-to-rent apartments in the community. On the 570 affordable homes that are allocated in the plans, Dublin City Council has confirmed that there is no deal on the table as to how much Johnny Ronan's company will demand for those homes. In order to ensure its profit margin, it is highly likely that the Ronan Group Real Estate could seek up to €500,000 from Dublin City Council for each of those affordable homes. How is anyone from the community expected to be able to afford to buy? The Minister needs to seek an urgent meeting with Ronan Group Real Estate and insist that the affordable homes on the site will be genuinely affordable.

The Government should make it very clear to Ronan Group Real Estate that there will be no bridge, and no funding allocated for such a bridge, unless there is a deal on affordability. Young people are putting their lives on hold because they are unable to afford to rent, they are unable to afford to buy, they are going through college getting highly educated, and they are looking at their future and asking what is the point in staying in this country when you cannot afford to leave your parents home? And that is if they are lucky enough to be able to stay in their parents' homes. The Government must double direct capital investment in social and affordable homes and start delivering for the people. We need to hear from the Minister about why he is ploughing ahead with the shared equity scheme and ignoring all of the warnings and how he will ensure that the affordable homes at the Poolbeg site will be genuinely affordable.