I should like to make some observations before this vitally important matter of the Housing Bill is disposed of by the House. I suppose it has been repeated ad nauseam during the course of the debate that the Dublin housing problem is the major one in the country. This is evident, and I do not think anybody needs convincing on the matter, by the number of questions on the Order Paper over the years as to the steps being taken or not being taken to deal with that problem.
Today, in reply to a question by Deputy Mullen, the Minister opened a window on how serious this situation is. He said that, at the moment, there are in urgent need of housing in Dublin 800 families consisting of five persons in one room, 1,676 families consisting of four persons living in one room and 1,165 families consisting of three persons living in one room. In the course of my regular visits to the corporation, I was informed yesterday by the official in charge of housing allocations that production at the Ballymun scheme has been very disappointing and because there has been a virtual halt on the hand-over by the contractor to the corporation over the past three weeks or possibly a month— because, in fact, Dublin Corporation have no new dwellings coming into their possession—the housing authority in the city now find themselves compelled once more to give priority to families consisting of eight persons in one room and, when they have been dealt with, families of seven persons in one room will then be taken up and, after them, families consisting of six persons in one room so that, I am told, it will be several weeks and possibly months before families consisting of five persons in one room are reached. So much was promised and so much was expected from the Ballymun scheme but progress so far has been very disappointing.
This great delay is an inevitable result of a lull or stoppage in house production. Families will increase in number, naturally. A family consisting of a man, his wife and three children today may well consist of a man, his wife and four, six or even seven children tomorrow, all depending on the will of the Almighty. Everything points to a very grave and critical situation in this city and when one mentions that the city is so badly affected, it follows that the county area and Dublin County Council must also be vitally concerned because the overflow of the problem reaches out to the boundary limits of the administrative area of the county.
How far the Bill will help to resolve this grave situation is something which we shall see by results. We know there is a vast problem. Any members of the House who, like myself, have the opportunity of regular contact with housing applicants must be worried and at times must indeed be anguished, if they have any feelings in them at all, by the cases which confront them.
I suppose that in other days, the Government and the local authorities dealing with housing were quite justifiably concerned with the problem principally as it affected families living in unfit, dangerous and unhealthy dwellings. The emphasis in this city has changed very much from that situation over recent years. The really agonising housing problem in Dublin city and county now concerns families living with in-laws in corporation or county council houses or cottages.
There is some fundamental law of nature, as we all know, which requires that a family should have its own abode and that no other family can occupy or share that abode if their is to be peace. This is particularly true where there is gross overcrowding as, indeed, we have in the city. We have many cases of young people getting married, being encouraged to get married with the best of goodwill by there parents and finding it impossible to obtain any kind of living accommodation. In other years, before the levelling of Georgian Dublin began, it was possible for such families to get a room in a tenament and to exist there for a while until eventually housed by the corporation, but, of course, practically all the tenements are now levelled.
As a matter of interest, I may say, in passing, that one would have to travel a long way in Dublin now to see a tenement house. All this is good and reflects credit on the Dublin housing authority. It has side effects which add to the problem in that it eliminates any other means of accommodation for these families, with the result that such young people getting married have no alternative but to live with their parents on one side or the other. Families grow and housing space becomes more and more restricted. Tensions develop. The more people have to live in close proximity with each other, the more they discern each other's faults and the more the unpleasantnesses of human nature come to the surface. Eventually, with the growth of such sub-tenant families, one comes up against problems of enormous dimensions, so much so that one has to spend Sunday morning interviewing people in this housing bracket, as some of us do. It is impossible at the end of a couple of hours not to feel utterly depressed at the thought that there is so much human misery and that one can do so little about it. The frustration felt by the average practising and much-abused and maligned politician cannot be beneficial to his health. It is certainly not beneficial to his mental health. It is liable to make one short-tempered and lose one's patience with the housing authority and, indeed, with the Minister who has the over-riding power as far as housing authorities are concerned.
The housing of sub-tenants is the principal problem in Dublin city and county. There are a vast number of sub-tenants, some of whom it was hoped would be relieved during the current year. I remember early last year, when first mention was made of the Ballymun project, being assured, in good faith, I am quite satisfied, by officials of the corporation that it was probable that houses would be available in some numbers at any rate—not great numbers—before the end of last year at Ballymun. Of course, as we know, houses have not even yet become available in Bailymun, certainly not in such condition that people can occupy them. I am told that houses are completed there but there are all sorts of complaints as to the condition of the houses, as to the fact that they are not properly finished. There are complaints as to the impossibility of approach to the houses. The roadways are covered with muck which makes it impossible for people to get near them. In most cases services have not yet been installed. So that, in effect, we have not got any houses in this scheme which was held out to us as being not just a solution but an early solution to the problem as it then was.
The problem has worsened in the meantime with the increase in the number of marriages and the increase in the size of sub-tenant families, especially in the area for which I am speaking particularly, Ballyfermot and that district. The problem has worsened and hopes have diminished. Having been assured last year through the press and other means, in good faith, as I say, by their representatives, that there would be relief for them, when they find themselves in this situation now, it is no wonder that such citizens begin to lose faith in the Government, whether it be local or central, and begin to imagine that no trust can be put in the words of politicians, that they mislead people and do not care about their problems, that it is all a cynical game. The truth is that very often a politician is very deeply concerned and is frustrated by circumstances over which he cannot exercise very much control.
I hope this Bill will do something— it does not hold out any great prospect of doing very much—to advance the day when houses will be available for all those who require accommodation. May I add that I hope the houses made available to the citizens will not be presented at such prohibitive rents as are now suggested by the Dublin City Manager? Mention has been made of rents of a level of £4.15.0—in or about that figure. It would seem to me to be losing all touch with reality to impose such charges on workingclass families. One must always remember that, regardless of talk about large sums of money being earned collectively by a family and the allegations concerning large sums going into one house, in modern times children who earn money save at least portion of it and have to save a considerable portion of it in order to be able to get married. It is completely unreal to imagine that a child who is earning a week's wages gives every halfpenny to the parents as, indeed, was done and had to be done for economic reasons in other times. In our father's days and to some extent in the days of people of my age group, it had to be done because the wages were very small and the total family income was only enough to keep the loaf on the table.
Times have changed and young people are earning higher wages because of the work of the trade unions down through the years and improved working conditions. There are families who as groups earn large amounts of money collectively but it is unreal to suggest that the earnings are pooled and that differential rents should be based on the assumption that they are pooled. That is unjust and unreal and does not take cognisance of the fact that the boys and girls in a family have a very natural inclination to get married and, in order to do so, must save for furniture and so on. The better, more energetic and thrifty among them save with the object of making a deposit on a house. How they face that prospect in this day and age baffles my imagination. The deposit that must be found now by any couple seeking to purchase a house by way of a Small Dwellings Act loan or a loan from a building society and paid over to what can only be described as housebuilding racketeers, is in the neighbourhood of £400 to £450. It takes a great deal of selfdenial to accumulate that sum of money from scratch. It takes a great deal of time and will power to watch it grow until it is sufficient to put into the grasping paw of people who are battening and making grossly unjust profits in the housing industry as a result of the demand for housing which these young people are creating.
These are facts which concern the House and which I hope the Bill will impinge upon to some extent. I do not see how the Bill can affect the matter of house prices. As long as the Government permit inflation to develop in the price of houses so long will the Government be justly accused of not doing its duty by the people.
I have already mentioned that people who want to buy their own houses and who save in order to do so should get every encouragement. Unfortunately, they are not getting it at the moment. I know of a number of cases of people proposing to get married who say: "What can we do? Where can we possibly get £400 or £450 to deposit on a house? We have no hope of getting a corporation house or flat. What is there for us but to go to England?" You say to them that it is just as difficult to get accommodation in England as it is here and they tell you that experience has shown that it is not. They point to many cases of families who have left here and gone to various parts of England who after some time suffering the great hardship arising from lack of accommodation have succeeded in getting housing accommodation at a much more speedy rate than they would get it here.
This all adds to the problem and points to the absolute urgency of the need to tackle the matter. I have talked about it until one becomes physically weary. I know the officials of the corporation who are charged with the responsibility of administering the Acts and the regulations are just as concerned as public representatives. I am not going to suggest, although it might be good politics to suggest, that the Minister is not as concerned as others. Any person knowing the problem and having any kind of human reaction must be concerned with it. We are not getting the results. We are in the same position now in Dublin city and county as we were 12 months ago. We had the hold-up in the county area of the Swords houses. The reason was that money is short. That is not good enough. Money may be short for other purposes and it could be argued that we could economise in other spheres of activity but we certainly should not economise in the matter of housing. There should be power taken to obtain money for housing in whatever way that is necessary.
It may be said that that would require increased taxation. We in this Party do not baulk at that issue. If we can be sure that money has to be raised by taxation for the provision of houses, or for any other worthy social welfare scheme such as an increase in old age pensions or anything of that nature, we do not sidestep the issue. We are quite prepared, provided we are satisfied that this is what the money will be spent on, to face up to the possible unpopularity that flows from supporting such proposals.
Apart from taxation, there must be other methods. Certainly, the high interest rates which are permitted by the Government to be charged to persons borrowing from building societies or from banks or from any other source of usury are a scandal and a shame. Steps should be taken by the Government to bring interest rates down. In house purchase as such the rate of interest chargeable on loans constitutes a very big factor in the eventual grossly inflated price which the unfortunate purchaser has to pay over a period of possibly 30 to 35 years. It is now estimated that a person purchasing a house at the present time, putting down a deposit of £400 or £450, will have to face outgoings of anything from £6 to £7 a week for the next 30 years. How people can face that prospect or the kind of salary they will need in order to be able to face it is beyond my understanding. That kind of debt and that kind of obligation has about it a ring of disaster and despair. The Government should take steps to control at least the interest rates and to exercise any other controls necessary in order to bring down the cost of houses for such people.
I should like to ask the Minister to clarify a point for me when he is replying. It is a technical point relating to houses built by Dublin Corporation for newly-weds. It has been stated to me by sources in the corporation that the present system whereby newly-weds are given houses and allowed to remain in them for five years and must then be offered alternative accommodation and removed from houses which are called newly-wed houses, will end with this Bill and that persons who have been living in such houses in Ballyfermot, for instance, for the past five years will be allowed to remain there, and that in future newly-weds will have to be provided for in new houses being built in schemes such as Ballymun. I would be obliged if the Minister could clarify the legal position in that regard.
I have mentioned Dublin city. The needs of Dublin county are equally urgent. I have not refrained from exercising my tongue on Dublin County Council, although, perhaps, it might be said that it is easy talking about a body of which one is not a member. If I were a member of that body, I would say the same thing. The record of Dublin County Council in the matter of housing is something on which they cannot pride themselves. The number built in that area in the past five years is extremely small. Those were the wasted years when there should have been a comprehensive housing programme in operation. If that programme had been in operation we would not now have a situation in which we have 2,000 applications before the county council for houses.
In the Swords area, which was the subject of numerous Dáil questions and on which there was an Adjournment Debate to which members of all Parties contributed, the position remains to some extent obscure. We are told that sanction is available for a scheme of 180 houses but we do not know for certain when money will be available to allow the scheme to go ahead or whether it can be started right away or not. I would implore the Minister to clarify the situation again for the benefit of the huge number of people around the Swords district who are living in desperately bad conditions and awaiting accommodation from the county council. What I have said about Swords can apply to every other area around the county, Rush, Balbriggan, Clondalkin, Lucan and Dundrum. One could go through the county parish by parish and there is in every district a housing problem which cries out to heaven for remedy.
I want to ask another question relating to unfinished estates. We were assured last year when the Town Planning Act was being passed by the House, that this whole problem, which is of many years standing and which is caused by reason of estates being left by developers in a deplorable condition of commonage and neglect, would be dealt with under that Act. We are now informed by the law agent of the county council that the Act in so far as these estates are concerned does not have retrospective effect and that the local authority has not got the power to go in and do the necessary work as the clearing up of dumps, the filling in of ditches and levelling out of commonages and to bill the developer with the cost.
We now understand that this is not possible in any retrospective sense. If that is so, the Act is vitiated as far as Dublin County Council is concerned. Will the Minister tell us now that he proposes to repeal that Act and to bring it back with a provision so as to give power to Dublin County Council and other local authorities throughout the country to go in on such estates and to give the Act retrospective effect. If he will do that and do it quickly, he will save me and others the trouble of taking up the time of this House with a private Bill. Otherwise, we will have no alternative but to bring in such a Bill.
