I move: That Dáil Éireann: recalls that: — under Housing for All - A new Housing Plan for Ireland, the failed housing plan of the last Government, a target of 33,450 new homes were projected for 2024 but only 30,030 homes were built, a decrease of 6.7 per cent on 2023, while the construction of new apartments fell by almost a quarter; — the former Minister for Housing, Local Government and Heritage told the Dáil in October 2024 "I have consistently said we will exceed that target. I still confidently predict … that it will be the high 30,000s to low 40,000s this year. There will be record completions in the last quarter of this year"; and — the leaders of Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael both repeatedly claimed in advance of, and throughout, the general election campaign that up to 40,000 homes would be built in 2024; recognises that: — there is broad agreement that at least 50,000 new homes a year must be built, but there is fundamental disagreement on the policies necessary to achieve that; and — unless there is radical change to the existing housing plan and the commitments in the Programme for Government, nowhere near 41,000 new homes will be delivered in 2025, or higher figures in the years to follow; notes that: — the Housing Commission report stated a "radical strategic reset" of housing policy is required to solve the current crisis; — Ireland currently has a shortfall of at least 250,000 homes and the Housing Commission research has outlined how Ireland may require up to 62,000 new homes per year up to 2050, while recent estimates suggest we will require more than 90,000 per year to address the housing shortfall; — in the past year alone, house prices have risen by almost 10 per cent, while rent prices have risen by 8 per cent, and since the introduction of Housing for All - A new Housing Plan for Ireland in September 2021, both have risen by more than a quarter; — nearly 70 per cent of 25-year-olds in Ireland are stuck living at home with their parents; — the number of people accessing emergency accommodation exceeded 15,000 people for the first time in November 2024, including more than 4,600 children, after rising persistently over the course of the implementation of the Housing for All - A new Housing Plan for Ireland plan, and official homelessness figures do not account for the many more people sleeping rough or the hidden homeless, such as those forced to couch surf, live in hostels or adults unable to move out of their family home due to prohibitive rent and house prices; and — the vast majority of people and families accessing emergency accommodation come from the private rental sector, and Ireland's homelessness crisis is exacerbated by weak tenancy rights; acknowledges that: — Housing for All - A new Housing Plan for Ireland has manifestly failed to deliver enough new housing to meet demand and tackle the housing crisis; — the previous Government ignored warnings and advice from the Housing Commission and other industry experts with regards to both housing targets and the appropriate model of delivery; — the private sector developer-led model of construction cannot deliver the quantity of homes necessary to meet demand; and — demand side measures like the Help to Buy (HTB) scheme and the Affordable Purchase Shared Equity Scheme have inflated house prices and will continue to do so, disproportionately benefiting those on higher incomes; agrees that: — the new Government must change course and ensure a State-led approach to solving the housing crisis; and — public housing should be defined as high-quality sustainable housing for all citizens regardless of income that is rented from one's local authority or its nominees Approved Housing Bodies to affordably and securely provide for one's particular housing needs; and calls on Government to: — take a more active role in the delivery of housing by properly resourcing the Land Development Agency (LDA), expand its power to Compulsory Purchase Order private land and assemble sites, and transform it over time into a State construction company to provide a permanent State capacity to deliver direct build homes and rebalance the housing system; — reverse the increasing centralisation of housing responsibilities by devolving more power to local authorities, introduce a single stage approval process and a single set of standardised design guidelines for low-cost energy efficient social homes, and resource the upfront delivery of community infrastructure where new homes are built; — introduce a land price register and bring down house prices by giving effect to the recommendations of the 1973 Report of the Committee on the Price of Building Land (the "Kenny Report"), implement land value sharing, and establish a land management and acquisition section within each local authority to ensure land availability to meet future public housing demands; — grow the construction workforce, starting with a minimum wage for craft apprentices; — develop new financing mechanisms for private home construction and AHBs by deploying the billions invested in the Future Ireland Fund, unlock private savings through a housing solidarity bond, and provide further opportunities for Credit Unions to underwrite mortgages and invest in housing; — phase out inflationary measures like the HTB scheme that disproportionately benefit those on higher incomes and replace them with more income-targeted supports; — ban no fault evictions and significantly restrict the ability of landlords to evict tenants on the basis of moving a family member into the house; — expand the Tenant-in-Situ Scheme and the Housing First scheme, with wraparound supports for those exiting homelessness; and — move quickly to deploy the Apple windfall to build more homes through the LDA, and expand the capacity of the water and electricity networks. I thank the Minister of State for being here, although I am quite disappointed that the housing Minister himself did not see fit to come to the House this morning-----

Sentiment score: 0.11

-----throughout this debate to hear this motion. That is very disappointing and if it is a sign of things to come, it is not a way to start off this Dáil term. Nevertheless, I am delighted to move this motion, the Labour Party’s first Private Members' motion of the Thirty-fourth Dáil. This motion calls for and sets out our vision for the radical reset in housing policy as called for in the Government’s own housing commission report, which it has, by and large and conveniently for itself, ignored. Ireland is not just in the midst of a housing crisis but a housing crisis that is getting worse and worse, and that the Government seems intent on worsening through successive ill-thought-out interventions that we know will only serve to line the pockets of property developers and institutional investors. Meanwhile, the burden of its failed policies will continue to fall on those who simply want to have a home of their own, and in particular renters in the private rented sector whose narrow shoulders, it looks like, will be forced to bear the burden of more rent increases. We in Labour are clear in our vision. The State must play a greater, more active and more interventionist role to solve this crisis, and when the State does intervene, it should be to increase the supply of social and affordable homes, not to turbocharge already inflated house prices and rents as Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael have done and appear intent and happy enough to continue doing. The Government likes to lecture us in the Labour Party, accusing us of populism and irresponsibility when we have consistently and continually put forward constructive, evidence-based solutions to the housing crisis. I find it ironic that the Taoiseach took to the media to float the idea of ending rent pressure zones, RPZs, on the hoof and without setting out a viable alternative to protect renters. That goes beyond irresponsibility; it is reckless. We know rent pressure zones are not a panacea but they are all many thousands of renters in the private rented market have between them and homelessness. The fact is, Housing for All has failed, and it needs more than a nip-tuck. The numbers speak for themselves. House prices are up more than 25%; rents are up by the same; homelessness is up by 70%; and worst of all, child homelessness is up by more than 75%. All of this is since Housing for All was introduced in September 2021. Fianna Fáil, to be frank, is going to need a better answer than accusing us of being disinterested at the prospect of going into Government to drive on with this failed policy. To lay the blame for the falling number of apartments being built at the door of renters and RPZs is simplistic and disingenuous. We know that ECB interest rates increased every quarter from the last quarter of 2022 until mid-2024. If the Government’s answer is to scrap one of the few protections renters have, then frankly, it is looking in the wrong place. The Government needs to realise that it is time for a complete reset on housing policy. We need to create a paradigm where housing becomes the bulwark of our commitment to reinforce our social pillar to allow everybody in this country to live in a secure home. I call on the Minister to meet and engage - well, I would call on him if he were here - with the new EU housing Commissioner as soon as possible and to invite him here, as this is a crisis where the EU can play a role, particularly around economic and state aid rules. If the Government really feels that its housing strategy is working, why did the Taoiseach unceremoniously dump the previous Minister and feel the need to fluff the numbers to get through the general election? The fact is that the Government is making it up as it goes along. Its policy is not working so it has resorted to the old reliable of ill-thought-out tax cuts for property developers. It is like, "Welcome back Fianna Fáil". It is like Government, or Fianna Fáil in particular, is a mere stepping stone away from heralding the return of the Galway tent. We know where that got us before and frankly, people my age still paying the price. I read the Government’s countermotion and it is as if it could have been generated by ChatGPT. It references the Housing Commission’s report that was published last May, the same report that this House has not even debated. It will not give one crumb of comfort to any renter in the private rented market terrified by what the Taoiseach said at the weekend on radio about rent pressure zones. We need a radically different approach if we are to have any hope of bringing the housing crisis to an end and this motion sets out what we believe that approach should be. Our key message is that the State needs to step up. We want Government to properly resource the Land Development Agency, LDA, to give it power to acquire land and not just from other State bodies, and to assemble land. We in the Labour Party supported establishing the LDA, but it needs to be given teeth. In my own city of Limerick, the agency has not turned, and will not turn, a single sod for many years. That is not acceptable and this is what we in the Labour Party mean when we talk about providing a permanent State capacity to deliver homes. We are not talking about some Soviet quango, as has been alluded to in the media. The LDA must be given the necessary resources to deliver zoned and serviced development land. The Government talks about cutting the cost of building homes, yet refuses to even consider implementing the recommendations of the Kenny report, which has been idle since 1973. Labour has been crying out for it to be implemented to bring down the cost of land and the cost of building homes. We have even done the work to produce a Bill that would implement those recommendations for the Minister of State, but the Government has stuffed its fingers in its ears. Instead, the policy is to continue transferring wealth to property developers and institutional investors without any guarantee that the savings from their proposed tax cuts will be passed onto putative homeowners. We are also calling on the Government not to leave renters in the cold grip of investors and landlords, and to bring forward a ban on no-fault evictions and introduce a rent freeze until supply improves. The Department of Finance estimated that €11.5 billion of private financing will be required to reach a target of 50,000 homes a year. Builders cannot access affordable bank loans or only have access to expensive private equity financing. The State needs to give them alternatives to vulture funds. This can be done by developing new financing mechanisms for private home construction by deploying the billions invested in the Future Ireland Fund and unlocking private savings through a housing solidarity fund. Housing is the single biggest issue in this country and the Government are not being honest with the people. It was wilfully misleading when it knew it would not reach its targets and now that it has completely run out of ideas, it is resorting to the same policies that germinated the seeds of this disaster, which have robbed an entire generation of young people of the dream of home ownership and will only line the pockets of big developers with taxpayers' money.

Sentiment score: -0.06

We have not been in government for ten years.

Sentiment score: 0.00