146. Deputy Eoin Ó Broin asked the Minister for Housing, Local Government and Heritage his plans to do to address the month on month rises in homelessness. [18167/26]
Sentiment score: 0.00
On Friday, the Minister's Department published the latest homelessness figures. They show record highs of homelessness, with more than 17,000 people, including more than 5,000 children, homeless. Since Deputy Browne has been Minister, homelessness has increased by 12% and child homelessness has increased by a significant 16%. Will the Minister set out what additional actions he intends to take to reduce the flow of adults and children into homelessness and get people into emergency accommodation more quickly?
Sentiment score: 0.06
The Minister's party and Fine Gael have effectively been in government together since 2016 and since then the total number of adults who have been forced into emergency accommodation because of their failed housing policies numbers 55,000. I ask the Minister to think about that for a moment. That is more than a capacity crowd at the Aviva Stadium. It is greater than the population of Longford or, indeed, of Drogheda. Rather than this being the Government's priority, the policies it is implementing are making this crisis worse. It is not delivering a sufficient volume of social and affordable homes. It slashed funding for vital homelessness prevention schemes last year, and this year it has reduced funding further and further restricted its use for tenant in situ. The Government has introduced a set of changes to rent setting in the private rental sector that is going to widen the gap between what people can afford and the market rents. Given that we have 20,000 or so eviction notices a year, more families and singles are going to end up homeless. I asked the Minister what new or additional measures he is going to take but he has not given any. For the second time, I invite him to tell us what he is going to do differently this year than last year to get a grip on this crisis he is making worse.
Sentiment score: -0.23
Yet the numbers of adults, children, families, singles and pensioners continues to rise almost every single month. By pushing up market rents, this is going to get worse. When we published our analysis based on RTB data of the cost of the market rent reset, the Minister rubbished it. He said it was not true. Yet, we already have evidence. A few days after the introduction of the new change, a tenant renting a one-bedroom apartment in Leopardstown moved out. The apartment was being rented for just over €2,000 until the middle of February. The property went back on the market on 1 March and the rent increased by 15%. That is almost an extra €4,000 in rent being charged, exactly in line with the RTB data and our analysis. The Government is allowing additional funding to be used for homeless exits but it is robbing Peter to pay Paul. It is reducing the funding to prevent people from becoming homeless. What it gains in exits, it will lose in preventions and more people will become homeless. None of what the Minister has said is new. Is he going to take any new different measures to get a grip on this crisis that he and his party colleagues are making worse?
Sentiment score: -0.12
The Minister has not in his own constituency.
Sentiment score: 0.00
The Minister missed his target again. What was the target? He missed the target.
Sentiment score: -0.20
The Minister has been in government for a decade.
Sentiment score: 0.00
The Minister missed his targets. He should be honest.
Sentiment score: 0.11
I do not think I shouted.
Sentiment score: 0.00
I politely interjected. The Minister's target was 10,000 and he missed it.
Sentiment score: -0.15
Fianna Fáil slashed capital funding for social housing.
Sentiment score: -0.23
148. Deputy Eoin Ó Broin asked the Minister for Housing, Local Government and Heritage his plans to address the unaffordability of cost rents. [18168/26]
Sentiment score: 0.00
The price of cost-rental accommodation is far too high. There is a growing number of working people, singles and couples, who earn too much to access social housing but because of the application of the affordability rule, they are not able to access cost rental. Can the Minister confirm that he shares my concern with respect to this matter and set out what he is going to do to assist the Land Development Agency, LDA, and approved housing bodies to bring down the cost of cost rental so it is affordable for all those people seeking to access it?
Sentiment score: 0.31
Earlier this week the Minister visited Oscar Traynor Road, where there are two- and three- bedroom cost-rental units. The two-bedroom units cost almost €1,600 per month and the three-bedroom units cost almost €1,800 per month. That means people need a net income of €54,000 to be able to access the two-bedroom units and €64,000 for the three-bedroom units. This tells us that a huge group of people who are not eligible for social housing, but whose incomes are below those levels, are locked out. Approximately 26% of applicants to the LDA's cost-rental stock are excluded on affordability grounds. For three-bedroom schemes run by local authorities and AHBs, it can be as high as 50%. The Minister has not even acknowledged there is a problem. We are all strong supporters of cost rental. If the Government had listened to us or to such organisations as NESC and the ESRI in the past, we would have been doing this a decade or more ago. However, right now, there are thousands upon thousands of working people who cannot access social housing, do not earn enough for cost rental and have no housing options. Does the Minister accept there is a problem? What will he do to address it?
Sentiment score: -0.01
The Minister's response is genuinely remarkable. He does not even accept there is a problem despite the fact that the data from the AHBs and the LDA confirms it. What is worse, LDA tenants are effectively paying corporation tax as part of the rent. That amounts to 15% of the rent they pay. Although the LDA has been given an exemption from corporation tax for new developments, that will not be passed on as an affordability measure, as per the Government. Worse, the LDA has just hit almost 500 of its tenants with rent increases that are entirely unjustified and those increases will range between 2% and 5%. This is at a time when rents should be coming down. I will give the Minister a third opportunity to respond. There is a growing number of people who earn too much to qualify for social housing and not enough to qualify for cost rental. Does he accept this is a policy problem his Department needs to examine? Does he accept, for example, that solutions such as passing on the corporation tax reduction and discouraging cost-rental landlords from increasing the rent would assist in tackling the genuine affordability problem for thousands of working people?
Sentiment score: -0.03
With 21 seconds left, the Minister cannot accept there is an affordability problem.
Sentiment score: -0.60
That is utterly shocking.
Sentiment score: -0.46