Earlier today in the short time available to me I was trying to evaluate the record of the Minister for Social, Community and Family Affairs, Deputy Ahern. I would now like to comment briefly on what is the even worse record of the Minister for the Environment and Local Government, Deputy Dempsey, the Minister of State at that Department, Deputy Molloy, and the Minister for Finance, Deputy McCreevy, in regard to housing. Just before Christmas, Focus Ireland estimated there were at least 140,000 people on local authority housing lists or homeless and that almost 54,000 families nationally were in this appalling situation. In the past two years there has been, at least, a 35% increase in the number of households on the lists in question. Many counties show a rise of approximately 100% in the number of families waiting for housing. Focus Ireland also warned that the Government social housing target of 25,000 new homes throughout the period of the PPF will not be achieved and that we need dramatic expansion in local authority housing, as proposed by the Labour Party.
With regard to Dublin specifically, each week Deputies meet perhaps dozens of homeless families, people on the waiting list for many years desperate to be rehoused. In my city council area, there are almost 7,500 households in dire housing need. There are perhaps 50,000 people waiting for housing in the four Dublin counties. These statistics show the dramatic failure of the Government in this area.
In the north-central area of Dublin City Council, area B, which comprises three city council wards, with a population of about 120,000 people, there are more than 3,000 families desperately competing for perhaps 100 or 150 homes per year. Many of these families have been on the list for many years. In the past year, for example, I have represented people who have been housed after 11 or 12 years. There are at least 1,000 families which are more than five years on the Dublin City Council housing list. Belatedly, we are now supposed to have a new scheme of letting priorities, but it will not give a much greater advantage to people who have been on the list for many years.
In Dublin city, there is a huge homeless list. Families in area B of Dublin North Central wait for well over a year for accommodation in areas of low demand. There is also a large transfer list in Dublin city following the appalling failures of State management over the years. The failure of the Minister, Deputy Dempsey, the Minister for Justice, Equality and Law Reform and the Minister for Finance has created dire circumstances for a very significant proportion of our people. The shared ownership scheme has not been working very efficiently in Dublin city, given that the most that can be granted is £140,000 by way of a mortgage. The affordable housing system has not yet started. In the neighbouring district of Fingal, which I also represent, circumstances are not much better. In my area of Howth-Malahide, there are almost 1,500 families waiting for housing, although, in parishes such as Howth, Sutton and Baldoyle, there has been no social housing whatsoever for the past three years.
It is clear that the current managerial system cannot cope with the major housing issues. They have been given absolutely no direction by Government. We certainly need to look at housing primarily on a regional basis. I do not think a line on a map of a district like Kilbarrack should create two totally separate housing policies on each side. This time last year, Dublin City Council presented a housing strategy, but we now seem to be falling hopelessly behind in terms of the types of housing production we need to meet the demand of 161,000 households in the greater Dublin region up to 2005. The National Economic and Social Forum proposed some time ago that one of the reforms should be to create a simple national housing authority which would frame strategic policy and offer technical support to Government and local authorities, perhaps like the Housing Executive in Northern Ireland. Most people regarded that as having worked fairly efficiently over the past 30 years. The national housing authority would provide a major guide to Government in tackling the housing problem.
I urge, in the dying days of the Government, the two Ministers concerned to take urgent action, especially in Dublin city and Fingal.
