With the Chair's consent, I wish to share time with Deputy McCormack.
Private Members’ Business.
Housing Provisions: Motion (Resumed).
The following motion was moved by Deputy McManus on Tuesday, 25 May 2004:
That Dáil Éireann, considering that the Fianna Fáil-Progressive Democrats Government has, during a period of unprecedented economic prosperity, failed to stabilise house prices and failed to provide for the housing needs of the people, calls for:
—the implementation of the report of the All-Party Committee on the Constitution in relation to building land, with a view to making housing affordable;
—the delivery of the 10,000 additional affordable houses which were to have been provided under Sustaining Progress and which have not even been started;
—a doubling of the production of social housing;
—the reversal of the cuts in rent allowance and the introduction of a housing benefit;
—the introduction of legislation to protect the consumer rights of home buyers; and
—the implementation of the integrated strategy on homelessness.
Debate resumed on amendment No. 1:
To delete all words after "Dáil Éireann" and substitute the following:
"acknowledges the achievements of the Government in:
—increasing housing supply as the key response to the broad range of housing needs and demand;
—achieving the 9th successive year of record housing completions involving the addition of 68,819 new houses in Ireland in 2004;
—continuing to develop measures to address affordability;
—putting in place a strong social and affordable housing programme involving investment of €1.8 billion in 2004;
—progressing the commitment in the Sustaining Progress partnership agreement to the delivery of an ambitious scale of affordable housing through the affordable housing initiative and Part V of the Planning and Development Acts 2000-02 and to reviewing the effectiveness of programmes designed to assist low income groups, including those with social and special housing needs; and
—introducing and resourcing an integrated strategy on homelessness;
and supports the continued actions by the Government to increase housing supply, and focus public expenditure on responding to the needs of low income households and those with special needs through a broad range of targeted initiatives."
—(Minister of State at the Department of the Environment, Heritage and Local Government, Mr. N. Ahern).
Is that agreed? Agreed.
When time unfortunately overtook me last night, I wanted to say to the Minister present then, who has not yet arrived, that of all the areas on which this Government can be condemned, none is greater than that of the Department of the Environment, Heritage and Local Government. The Government has failed the young generations. It has failed to arrest the spiralling house prices and build adequate local authority houses. It has created a stigma attaching to many local authority schemes throughout the country by virtue of the sheer scarcity of houses and number of people who must now vie with each other to be rehoused. It has failed to recognise what was happening all around it, pretending that it was seriously attending to the issue but doing nothing.
At present, the average price of a house in the greater Dublin area is €300,000. We hear a great deal in this House about 1996 and 1997, which are compared with today. In 1996, which was the time of the rainbow coalition, the price of a house was €88,000. It was about €75,000 nationally. I have heard many comparisons made, but I have not heard that one, or any recognition on the part of the Government that it had erred, and that is just one example.
The same Government also let down those who applied for disabled persons' grants for housing. It increased the grant amount and then froze activity so that none might be paid. There are currently countless people up and down this country who have applied for disabled persons' grants and been waiting for an OT assessment. That has been deliberately slowed down to ensure that nothing was approved and nothing would have to be paid. In every local authority area there are countless people with special needs awaiting an urgent allocation from the Department of the Environment, Heritage and Local Government through the local authorities, and nothing ever comes. There are still 50,000 to 60,000 people on the housing list. Nothing has been done to address that issue. Nothing will ever be done to do so.
Last night the Minister apparently did not understand how the new regulations are working. It was pointed out to him that a person must be virtually homeless before he or she can get a subvention from the health board towards accommodation. He denied that, but in the intervening period I received a reply from the Minister for Social and Family Affairs, Deputy Coughlan, which clearly states that the person who applied for a subvention from the health board is not deemed homeless and as such does not qualify for anything. That person must pay for the first six months of renting accommodation alone.
There are approximately 6,000 homeless people here at present. The Minister rubbished that figure several times. First, he said they were being counted too carefully and that, as a result of the extra special counting taking place, more people were turning up. He has now come to the conclusion, of which the Government evidently approves, that there is no homelessness problem here. Yet in all our constituencies, we daily find people deemed to be homeless. We daily find people being referred to hostels. We find people who have nowhere else to go other than the side of the road, and they are daily being referred to hostels, if they are lucky.
I thank the Minister of State opposite for arriving in the House. I know it is not his area of responsibility, but he is very welcome. It is a sign of the times that both the Minister for the Environment, Heritage and Local Government and the Minister of State at the Department of the Environment, Heritage and Local Government are missing. They are the missing link in all this, since they have the responsibility for providing for housing needs.
I cannot understand why no one has copped on to the reason house prices are high — why houses have become unattainable from the point of view of first-time buyers. The Government clearly set out with a plan in mind. It decided to remove the first-time house buyer from the market altogether. First it decided to remove the new house grant. Second, in case they escaped that one, it decided to introduce levies, which were a double penalty. However, the real reason house prices are high is that the Government gets a significant amount in VAT, which is increasing daily. Every time house prices go up, the Government gets more in revenue. Even before the recent levies had been introduced, the Government was taking more than 40% of the price of a house from every young person who attempted to buy one for the first time.
Those are only a few of the issues. It is not possible in the time available to go through the entire debate properly. I am not saying the Government should find extra money through taxation. However, there are various ways to do so. It should sell those electronic ballot boxes the Minister for the Environment, Heritage and Local Government is paying rent to store somewhere. The Government might get €52 million for them or even more than €60 million; it might not get anything at all. However, it would be a good idea to sell them to someone, perhaps to a scrap merchant who could melt them down or sell them by weight.
The Government could use the €62 million to address the seriousness of the housing issue as it now stands. If that is not done soon and this issue is not dealt with in the near future our young people will emigrate for the sake of a house. Once they emigrated for a job, but now they will have to emigrate to get a house.
I know we have a tiger economy, that we feel good about ourselves and enjoy the feel-good factor, and that we all go down to Galway races every year, into the tent in Ballybrit to celebrate the occasion. However, I find it very difficult to understand how a second-hand three-bedroom house with a swimming pool facing the sea on the Gulf of Texas can be bought for $130,000 while here we cannot get a simple three-bedroom semi-detached house in a local authority housing estate for much less than €300,000. There is something wrong. The Government lost control long ago and has neglected and ignored the plight of young people, whose needs have not been served.
I am glad of the opportunity to speak on this motion tonight to condemn the Government's inaction on every aspect of housing. That is what the motion covers. I compliment the Labour Party Members for tabling this timely motion. The Government's record on housing is so bad that one hardly knows where to start. However, perhaps I should start with an announcement made by a Minister in my constituency yesterday or the day before. He had great tidings for the people of Galway city and county when he announced €2.6 million for disabled persons' and essential repairs grants for Galway County Council, and €880,000 for essential repairs grants for Galway City Council.
This was a cynical exercise two weeks before the general election. Usually the allocations to local authorities are made in June or July. However, this year because Fianna Fáil and the Government parties are feeling the heat at the doors, the Minister comes up with this announcement just before the election. It is a cynical exercise because, as Deputy Durkan said, for the past two years applications for disabled person's grants and essential repair grants have not been dealt with by local authorities. They have not been dealt with because the money was not there. The applicant applies first, then a health inspector goes out and does a report and then the local authority tells the applicant whether the grant is sanctioned. Over the past year or so health inspectors have not gone out to examine those cases simply because the money was not there. Towards the end of last year local authorities informed applicants that the money was not there. That was a new departure. Up to that they were just stalling the applications. The money being made available to local authorities in the run-up to the local and European elections will not cover the backlog of applications awaiting sanction and health inspectors' reports.
After the many deceptions in the general election I do not believe the people, when it comes to voting in the local and European elections, will fall for this gimmick — I hope they do not. People are getting somewhat tired of that sort of thing coming up to elections. What has the Government done about the housing situation? The average price of a house in Ireland now is over €250,000. Local authority housing waiting lists are at 50,000. Some 1,500 people are on the waiting list in my local authority of Galway city, and the figures for Galway county are just as bad. I have sympathy with the Minister of State at the Department of the Environment, Heritage and Local Government, Deputy Noel Ahern, who in the House last night had to read out the script written for him. He stated he was proud of the number of houses built. He mentioned so many houses being built I thought we would see cement coming out of his boots. He was steaming over the number of houses built. He was proud that 15 houses were built for every 1,000 of the population.
The average family size in Ireland is 2.1 so the Minister of State is only building a house for every six people. That means that two thirds of the people will not get houses, and that is something the Minister of State said he was proud of. That record is nothing to be proud of. Most remarkable of all, the Minister of State said housing remains the top priority of the Government's agenda. He said the Government had taken a wide range of measures over the course of its two terms in office to reduce house prices, but it has done exactly the opposite. In the last budget it removed the €3,800 grant for first-time buyers. It increased VAT on housing, which was already at 12.5%——
We gave it on taxes.
It was announced before the budget. It was all the same to the house buyer anyway. It added 1% VAT in the budget on building materials for housing. On top of that the Minister for the Environment, Heritage and Local Government, Deputy Cullen, forced local authorities to introduce development charges. In my city development charges are €10,000 per house. That is an average of about €15,000 imposed on the first-time buyer. Some 40% of the cost of a house is accounted for by Government charges, between VAT on materials and everything else. Some people argue that the cost of land is driving up the cost of houses. That argument is not fully sustainable because I have done figures for Galway city and only between 5% and 10% of the cost of a house is attributable to the cost of the land for the site, depending on available densities — high density building is common.
The Government has done the exact opposite to what the Minister of State is saying. He is saying the Government is doing everything in its power, that housing is its highest priority etc. I fear to think what is happening to its lowest priority if the result of the highest priority is to add €15,000, directly by Government intervention in the past eight or nine months, to the cost of a house. The Minister of State has much to answer in that regard.
Some 68,000 houses is a great achievement.
Half of them were for investors.
They were Irish people.
Deputy McCormack, without further interruption from any side.
If Deputy Cassidy could restrain himself, I would put it on the record. The record shows that house prices have trebled since the Fianna Fáil-Progressive Democrats Government came to power. In 1996 the average cost of a house was £97,000. It is three times that today. That is the record, and that is a fact. That is what has priced housing out of the reach of the ordinary working young person. Under the partnership agreement, Sustaining Progress, the Government agreed to provide 10,000 affordable houses. Where are they? Where is that number? If either of the Ministers was here I would ask them. Why has the Government shied away from implementing any of the proposals in the Kenny report? That is a question the Government has not answered.
Another stunt announced by the Minister for the Environment, Heritage and Local Government, Deputy Cullen, in March was that he would free up planning in local authority areas for once-off housing. This was another gimmick for the local elections. He did nothing of the sort. He made it more difficult in some local authorities. He issued draft guidelines which are not yet fully operable so nothing will be done before the elections. If any local authority has to change its policy as regards planning, there has to be an alteration to the development plan. It is not enough for the Minister to simply say there should be less restrictions on once-off rural houses. The development plan, of course, cannot be changed before the elections, and the Minister hopes to get away with the gimmick of pretending to the people in rural Ireland that he will make it easier for them to get houses in local authority areas. Most of what the Minister has sent out to local authorities is already featured in most county development plans and if not, it cannot be done. Therefore that was another gimmick that the Government could not get away with.
Deputy Durkan suggests that the Minister should sell the electronic voting machines which cost €52 million, but they are valueless now except as souvenirs. The ballot boxes which were purchased for many local authorities in anticipation of the Minister's mad rush to introduce electronic voting are already sold and will have to be replaced at a further cost. By the time the Minister, Deputy Cullen, who is responsible for this Department, and for the motion we are dealing with tonight, is finished with electronic voting, he will have cost the taxpayers of this country up to €100 million, between storage, compensation to the company and everything else concerned with that. Yet we have a housing crisis on our hands.
There are 6,000 people homeless in this country. If the Government ploughed back the amount of revenue it is taking off the housing sector in taxes on the building of houses — 40% on the cost of a house — there would be enough money to provide local authority houses for the people in need. How can one explain to a person in Galway city who comes into a political clinic why he or she is six years on a housing list and still has not been offered a house? People are living in deplorable conditions and cannot be offered a house until they are six years on the housing waiting list. At the same time the Minister for Social and Family Affairs, Deputy Coughlan, has restricted the rent supplement scheme. If a person, now in overcrowded conditions in the family home, probably with a young child, has to move out, he or she must be six months in rented accommodation before qualifying for rent supplement.
That is the condition in which the Government has left people in need of housing in my constituency and every other constituency throughout the country. I hope that the people on 11 June will have an opportunity to get the first claw-back at the Government for the broken promises of the general election, particularly the housing crisis.
I wish to share my time with Deputies Seán Power and Gallagher. I welcome the opportunity to speak on this motion tonight. It is one of a number of motions that have been tabled by the Opposition over the lifetime of this Dáil.
No punches have landed on the Government on the housing issue. This is due to the excellent stewardship of the economy by the Government since it returned to power in 1997. The public has confidence in the economy and is prepared to invest substantially in buying homes. The Government, especially the Minister for Environment, Heritage and Local Government and his Minister of State with responsibility for housing, should be commended. The Minister and his predecessors must take a great deal of credit for the fact that last year almost 69,000 house units were completed. This year that figure will possibly exceed 70,000 units.
Several factors have contributed to this confidence: unemployment rates are low, employment is at an all time high with almost 500,000 more people at work than there were 14 or 15 years ago, interest rates are low and the mortgage market has never been so competitive. All the financial institutions are vying for business because they know it is good business. The risks that existed in the 1970s and 1980s are no more. There is a well-educated population employed in good permanent jobs where they are paid well and do not have too much difficulty repaying mortgages.
One area the Government had to tackle and which remains a problem is the supply of housing. Over the past two years however, there has been an increase in the number of units, houses and apartments being built which has begun to affect the annual increase in the cost of housing. This has tapered off to the point that we no longer see the increases of 15% and 20% which were evident in the mid to late 1990s. With the increase in supply of units, the increases should only be of the order of 3% and 4%.
I was interested to read in the past two days some economic commentators writing about continued confidence in the housing sector and that people are still prepared to buy. Last night, the Minister of State set out the reasons for the high cost of housing. We are only now starting to match the cost of living among our continental European neighbours. The high cost is due to a relatively low supply. It took us some time to gear up to the point where the construction industry could provide the quantity and quality of housing units required but the large demand exceeded the supply.
Housing supply continues to be a priority for the Government, but with more than 70,000 units to be completed this year, that difficulty has been addressed and it will be sorted when the Government's term is complete. There is criticism of local authorities, particularly in regard to the provision of land. Nobody can condone what happened in the past which is now under investigation at the tribunals sitting in Dublin Castle. If local authorities adopted a policy of making much more land available for building, that would reduce the cost of sites which contributes to the high cost of housing. Developers are slow to concede that more land should be zoned for housing but it is one solution to the problem. The more land that is zoned for housing, the more competition there is for the construction industry. Healthy competition between landowners whose land is designated for residential development will bring market forces into play and reduce the cost of sites.
The increase in construction output also has a major part to play. The industry was never in such a healthy state. In the 1980s, the best of our tradesmen travelled to the United Kingdom, France and Germany for work and, in the early 1990s, many talented individuals who had trained and completed their apprenticeship here were forced to move overseas to work. They were pleased to return later and find good well-paid jobs here. Thankfully they remain here and we have a healthy, strong and stable construction industry. Long may it last.
There is healthy competition in the mortgage market which is good for those who decide to buy a home. Last week many of the financial institutions advertised rates that two or three years ago would have been regarded as uncompetitive. Had one suggested five years ago that rates today would be 2.5% or 3%, one would have been laughed out of court. The mortgage market is strong and a wide range of mortgage products are available. Competition between estate agents and the legal profession is also beneficial to those trying to enter the housing market. Estate agents now enter into negotiations with potential vendors to negotiate their fees and solicitors for the first time ever are prepared to negotiate their fees with clients. This is welcome and should be encouraged.
The Government must continue to introduce measures to boost supply because only by doing that can it maintain some hope of keeping the price increases for new houses at an acceptable level. Local authority output is also increasing and the Minister of State last night spoke of the number of new houses completed last year for local authorities. His allocation of capital funding this year also marks an increase. Local authorities have been the cornerstone of the provision of housing for those who are not in a position to buy their own homes. The quality and standard of local authority housing over the past ten to 15 years has improved greatly. A total of 13,000 housing units was provided last year and in the greater Dublin area. The housing output of Dublin City Council and the various local authorities has also increased at great cost to the authorities. This year the local authorities will build more houses than ever before.
The Government maintains a strong social housing programme, and affordable housing is one area in which more progress could be made. More than 9,500 householders have benefited from this and the shared ownership scheme since January 1999. The supply of affordable housing is being boosted by the implementation of the provisions of part 4 of the Planning and Development Act 2000. While this part of the Act was slow to be implemented because developers did not want to encourage it, for obvious reasons, it is now falling into place because the land which was available to developers has been exhausted and they must now apply to local authorities which can avail of this Part IV provision.
The private rental sector has been the subject of much criticism in the House, especially during Private Member's debates in recent years, but it did play a crucial role until now in the provision of houses for people who for different reasons could not afford to buy a home. The legislation that was introduced over the years underpinned the regulation of that sector. We have all heard of various wrongdoings by individual landlords. I hope tenants will have more protection because of the legislation now in place.
The Government has spent a great deal of money on the provision of funding for the homeless. This is a difficult and sensitive area because of the social and financial difficulties in which those people find themselves. Departments are sensitive to their needs. I pay tribute to the Society of St. Vincent de Paul for its work in this regard. With the assistance of the Department of Health and Children, the Department of Social and Family Affairs and the voluntary efforts of many people, it has provided accommodation for many homeless people.
Traveller accommodation is another area of which the Government is conscious. A great deal of funding has been provided to local authorities to upgrade the standard of Traveller accommodation, especially in the past five years. Figures from the end of 2003 indicate that the number of families on unauthorised roadside sites, which we have all seen, was less than 800 compared to 1,207 at the end of 1999.
I commend the Government on its work. It is not an easy area but the record of the Government is there for all to see. I am confident that under the stewardship of the Taoiseach, the Minister for the Environment, Heritage and Local Government and the Minister of State at that Department with special responsibility for housing, Deputy Noel Ahern, we will continue to see progress in this regard.
I wish to share time with the Minister of State at the Department of the Environment, Heritage and Local Government, Deputy Gallagher.
Is that agreed? Agreed.
Since I first came to the House I have paid particular attention to Private Members' business. The Opposition always tries to paint the scenario of the barrel being half empty and the Government alleges it is half full. It is no different as we discuss the important issue of housing.
The Labour Party motion calls for the implementation of the report of the All-Party Committee on the Constitution in regard to building land, the doubling of the production of social housing, the reversal of the cuts in rent allowance and the introduction of legislation to protect the consumer rights of home buyers, in addition to other areas.
Reading the motion, one could be forgiven for believing that nothing has been done. The reality is that much has been achieved. Few issues have received a similar level of attention from the Government as housing. The Minister of State outlined many of the Government's achievements in this regard in recent years. This is the ninth successive year of record housing completions. Last year over 68,000 units were completed and the indications are this figure will be surpassed this year.
Tremendous growth has been evident in the housing sector since the early 1990s and indications suggest this will continue. Most people find the rate of house price increase worrying. While it is still a concern, the matter is not as serious as it was in the previous decade. However, I accept that people in well-paid jobs are finding it increasingly difficult to get on the housing ladder.
They cannot buy houses.
That is not an acceptable situation and the Government is keen to address it. A problem exists in that regard despite the efforts of the Government. It is our policy to increase housing supply to the level where it meets demand and to address the problem of affordability. There appears to be a greater emphasis in Ireland than elsewhere on owning one's own home rather than renting. Some people have found it almost impossible to buy a home and it still remains a dream for them.
We must examine the factors that have brought about this situation. We have witnessed a major boom in the economy in recent years. More people have been working and in better-paid jobs. Inflation has also been low for many years which provides an opportunity for people to get involved in the housing market for the first time. The rate of house price increase has been more evident in Dublin than elsewhere in the country. Many people in Dublin have sold their houses and moved to neighbouring counties. In many cases, they moved to larger properties and still have money in their back pockets. They probably also have a better quality of life. Decentralisation has already begun and we look forward to it continuing in the coming years.
The Minister of State indicated he had asked local authorities to draw up a five year action plan to deal with the housing problem. Some authorities have been pro-active in dealing with the matter while others have not done so to the same extent. It is important the Minister would deal with those local authorities that have a duty and responsibility to deal with the matter in a responsible fashion.
Part V of the Planning and Development Act 2000 was introduced with great fanfare. We were promised it would solve many of our problems. Developers were reluctant to get involved in the early stages but the Minister dealt with the issue. I would expect to see a significant increase in the number of houses being made available under Part V in the coming years.
We cannot be happy with the waiting lists for local authority housing. Many local authorities are failing to make significant inroads into it and this must be addressed. It is difficult to understand the reason for this at a time when we have a boom in the economy and significant revenue at our disposal. I look forward to a significant change taking place in that regard.
The Oireachtas Joint Committee on the Environment, Heritage and Local Government decided to examine the issue of homelessness. On Tuesday, 25 May 2004 we invited people working at the coalface of this problem to come before the committee. They gave us the benefit of their experience and explained how they would like to see the matter dealt with. Everyone who came before us was extremely complimentary about the success in recent years. Since the launch of the homeless strategy in 2000, considerable progress has been made in providing accommodation throughout the country. That is a welcome development.
There is one matter which requires examination, namely, the length of time it takes local authorities to reallocate houses when the keys are returned. One can drive anywhere in the country and one will see local authority houses lying vacant. In many instances, they require little or no renovation. That is a shame, particularly at a time where there are long queues of people waiting to take up local authority houses. It is unnecessary that these houses are left vacant for so long. I ask the Minister of State to ensure that this matter is examined.
The priority afforded by the Government to housing is clear. Last evening, my colleague, the Minister of State with responsibility for housing and urban renewal, Deputy Noel Ahern, outlined what is by any standards a remarkable record of achievement on the part of the Government in respect of housing and the effectiveness of our approach. It must have made dismal listening for the Labour Party and exposed the shallowness of its housing policies and its motivation for bringing forward the motion at this time.
The Government has a clear and comprehensive housing strategy which is designed to increase housing supply, improve access to housing for lower income groups and improve the housing conditions of local authority tenants and other key groups such as the elderly, homeless persons and the disabled. Nothing that has emanated from the other side of the House has discredited this fact. We must take it, therefore, that Labour, in bringing forward this motion, wants us to reverse our policies, which have yielded record levels of housing output.
The Government is delivering record levels of housing output. We have set a record for each year in Government. In 1993, 21,391 houses were delivered. A little over a decade later, we have trebled that output, with 68,819 units completed last year.
It trebled the price of houses.
We need to continue to increase supply to ensure that our young population can aspire to home ownership or seek rented accommodation, whether in the private or social housing sector. Increasing supply is and must remain the main objective of the Government's housing strategy.
Who wrote the Minister of State's script?
Mar a dúirt mé go minic anseo, tá an fhírinne searbh.
I acknowledge that for some people home ownership has become more difficult. That is why the Government places great emphasis on increasing output under affordable housing measures. The affordability of the housing provided is the key. Factors such as increases in disposable incomes, low mortgage interest rates, favourable taxation rates and, above all, increased housing supply, including affordable housing, have provided the opportunity for many young families to obtain homes of their own.
We have continued to develop the range of responses to housing need. The significant progress made on the delivery of affordable housing is an important part of this response. It recognises that, with a small amount of assistance, many people can purchase a home of their own. Since January 1999, 9,600 households have benefited under the affordable housing and shared ownership schemes.
We have also expanded the range of delivery mechanisms for the provision of affordable and social housing. Most significant in this context is the successful implementation of Part V of the Planning and Development Act 2000, as amended. In 2003, over 160 units were acquired under Part V with momentum building up all the time. There are nearly 1,900 units under construction or proposed on foot of Part V agreements. This level of activity should result in a further significant increase in output in 2004.
The Sustaining Progress affordable housing initiative is a critical element of the Government's elaboration of approaches to deal with the full spectrum of housing need. The Government's decisions in July and December 2003 to release State lands to the initiative will ensure, together with affordable housing coming on-stream through Part V arrangements, that progress will be made quickly on the delivery of affordable housing on the ground. This initiative is a priority for the Government and we will continue to work to accelerate projects to boost the supply of affordable housing in the market in the coming years.
It is worth repeating that the total provision for housing in 2004 is €1.884 billion, representing an increase of 5.4% on the 2003 provision. The increase in the housing provision will allow for 5,000 starts under the main local authority programme, an increase of 500 above 2003 levels, and a further 500 commencements under area regeneration programmes in 2004.
The Government has recognised the unique contribution that the voluntary and co-operative housing sector can make to providing housing for low and middle-income households and special needs groups. It is expected that the sector will provide 1,800 units of accommodation in 2004. Many of the housing units being provided by local authorities and voluntary and co-operative bodies in 2004 will be let to persons with special needs and persons on low incomes. The combination of social housing measures, including the shared ownership scheme, affordable housing schemes, voluntary housing and the traditional construction programme will meet the needs of 13,000 households in 2004.
The Minister of State with responsibility for housing and urban renewal, Deputy Noel Ahern, outlined the major advances the Government has made in tackling the issue of homelessness. Record levels of funding and the necessary organisational arrangements to ensure that homelessness is tackled in an integrated manner match our commitment in this respect.
I reiterate that the Government's response to overall housing needs is credible, comprehensive, well funded and, above all, working. These are the simple facts and there is nothing the Opposition has said during this debate that has taken any of the gloss off the Government's achievements in delivering on its commitments in this key area of national policy.
I will bring to the attention of the Minister of State, Deputy Noel Ahern, the point raised by Deputy Seán Power in respect of ensuring that houses that become vacant are allocated as quickly as possible. I accept that this is a matter for local authorities but I will raise it with the Minister of State.
I wish to share time with Deputies Connolly, Cowley, Cuffe and Crowe.
I welcome the opportunity to speak on this important motion which deals with the housing crisis. The first thing members of the Government must do is take their heads out of the sand and accept that there is a major housing crisis and that not enough is being done to assist young people. That is the position in the real world. I do not know what planet the Minister of State is living on but we have a major housing crisis and there are in excess of 50,000 people on local authority waiting lists.
Politicians from the major parties mainly represent the wider interests of those parties and various other vested interests rather than the well-being of the people who elect them. All too often the opinions and needs of local communities are ignored and pushed aside, particularly in respect of planning developments, with the consultation process provided only as window dressing.
Dublin has been increasingly neglected by successive Governments in recent years, with local authorities being underfunded. Young families are being forced out of their own city due to spiralling property prices, the abolition of the first-time buyer's grant and the shortage of housing stock. That is what is happening in reality and these are the issues the Minister of State must confront. Something must be done about housing. At a minimum, 10,000 additional affordable houses and more local authority houses must be provided and legislation to protect the consumer rights of house buyers must be introduced.
As regards the cost of building land and the activities of the rip-off merchants, what is required is the full implementation of the report of the All-Party Oireachtas Committee on the Constitution with a view to making housing affordable. We also need to introduce a housing benefit. In addition, we must have the total implementation of the integrated strategy on homelessness. We need to double our local authority construction programmes. In poorer times in the 1930s, 1940s and 1950s we built more local authority houses for our people. The Government's record on housing is simply not up to scratch.
The fact that Ireland has a housing crisis is well established. However, the fact that people with disabilities are caught up in this crisis is scantily appreciated. I put forward four simple ideas to assist people with disabilities in respect of housing. First, the Departments of the Environment, Heritage and Local Government and Health and Children must develop a national accommodation and support strategy for people with disabilities. Second, local authorities must increase the disabled person's grant to cover 100% of the actual cost of approved building work in line with the recommendation of the Commission on the Status of People with Disabilities. Third, individual local authority review measures must be scrapped and a national standardised process developed. Fourth, local authorities must work with voluntary and State agencies and with representatives from local communities to help integrate housing for people with disabilities.
These constructive proposals are the issues in this debate. I urge all Members to support the motion and do something practical for the over 50,000 people waiting for a home. I urge them to do something constructive for our young people who cannot afford a home in their area. Then and only then can we truly say we are sharing the wealth of this healthy, vibrant country. I urge all Deputies to support the motion.
I am delighted to have this opportunity to speak on this motion. From the day it assumed office, this Government has shown itself to be more than lax in the provision of social and affordable housing. In 2002, it embarked on a con job par excellence in committing the Government to the provision of 10,000 additional affordable houses.
Earlier tonight I heard a Deputy on the Government side of the House talk about the number of houses that were built. He has missed the point. Tonight's debate is about social and affordable housing. The Minister of State spoke earlier about putting a gloss on issues and that is what the Government has been doing for some time. It is more concerned about the gloss it can put on every issue than anything else. Tonight the issue is housing and the Government is concerned about the picture it can paint or the type of gloss it can put on the issue. The Minister of State's words were so apt because that is how the Government has behaved.
Two years since the promises were made, the slogan "A lot done" rings hollow in the ear for many people. There is a lot more to do in regard to housing as many houses have not yet been started. There are over 50,000 families on the combined local authority housing lists throughout the country. It does not appear to have registered with the Government that we have, effectively, a housing emergency. I do not know how else anybody could describe it, taking into consideration the volume of people on the waiting lists.
The building of 6,000 units per annum barely keeps pace with the number of people going onto lists. We can only describe the lists as a catalogue of human misery. Those families currently on the bottom of the list may never get to the top of the list. Even after 20 years waiting on the list, it is possible they may never be housed.
The gap between those who can and those who cannot afford housing is growing constantly. One only has to drive around the country to see the big houses being built, yet the list of people waiting for houses is also growing. In the Government cutbacks, which the Government refused to acknowledge as cuts, the local authority housing budget was cut by 16%. When we take inflation into consideration, this amounts to almost 20%. Will a full-scale assault ever be made on the apparently endless housing lists?
Some Deputies have spoken about the report of the All-Party Committee on the Constitution with regard to building land. The report concluded that constitutional considerations were not an obstacle to the question of providing affordable land to local authorities for the purpose of providing affordable housing. Its recommendations have been met with typical inaction on the part of the Government. It is adding to the woes of the people. The first-time buyer's grant of €4,500 has been abolished and in addition there is an €8,000 levy. The typical first-time buyer is now charged an extra €12,500. This puts extra strain on the resources of young people and forces them onto waiting lists. We now have a situation where parents must remortgage in order to plug that gap and get their children on the housing ladder.
Everybody would agree that people should have a right to housing. This Government strives to ensure that internationally. However, charity begins at home. Housing is not a question of charity but of justice and equality. Anyone involved in politics sees an endless succession of people in constituency offices, particularly single people with absolutely no hope, looking for accommodation. As soon as there is rumour of allocation of a development, an avalanche of people seek the same few houses. This is demoralising for people. When we look at the volume of output in the building sector and the acres of housing and realise how large the waiting lists are, we must ask what kind of society we have that it tolerates a situation where private enterprise rules the day and people's real needs are not adequately addressed.
The Minister of State said he realises the value of voluntary housing. The provision of social housing is housing with a heart, particularly housing provided by voluntary community groups which become involved in setting up housing associations. Housing with a heart is housing in the community for the community. I have personal experience of this. It allows people to stay in their community. Infrastructure is what people need in their community. If there are no services in an area people will leave the area. However, if the infrastructure is provided to allow people to stay in their community, they will stay.
For example, our St. Brendan's Village in Mulranny is the biggest local employer and employs 65 people. These people would otherwise have to leave the area. Some people come from surrounding areas to work in St. Brendan's Village. This shows how infrastructure can be a powerful economic regenerator in an area. People in such an area will stay in the area, visit the doctor in the area, use the local shop, etc. Regeneration is all about retaining services and infrastructure and can be a result of voluntary housing, which demonstrates its value.
There are problems with the availability of land which should be addressed. Provision has been made for some State land for affordable housing under Sustaining Progress. Social housing must be part of the equation also. If there is not enough building land houses cannot be built. The budget for the targeted number of units is inadequate. How can we reach the target if we do not have an adequate budget?
I will probably repeat the points made by other speakers. However, it is important that we make these points. There is a housing crisis and people need to wake up to that. For every decade since the foundation of the State there has been a housing crisis.
One speaker said the crisis was due to the slowness in the handing over of houses at council level. That affects only a handful of houses. The crisis we are talking about affects between 48,000 and 50,000 families, yet he spoke about the turnover of five or six houses in each local authority area as if a faster turnover would resolve the problem.
The difficulty is that the housing problem is not a Government priority and nobody at Cabinet level is concerned about it. It is an indictment of the Minister with responsibility for housing that he is not here tonight. He always passes the issue to his junior Minister as if it is not a problem. People must ask why housing is not a priority for the Government. We were given figures stating 6,000 housing units were built. How will that affect the 48,000 people on the housing list?
All the figures suggest the lists get longer each year and that they are not getting any shorter. That is the problem that needs to be addressed. If we do not wake up to the fact there is a crisis, the crisis will continue. Other Ministers have said there is no gap between rich and poor. The reality is, as anybody dealing with poverty can tell us, the crisis exists. Why has this Government failed to make housing a priority when every elected representative in the House knows there is a problem? Any Member who holds a clinic knows people turn up each week to ask about their chances of getting a house or a home.
I attended a Simon Community press conference early this week at which the society spoke about the homeless in this city. It said that of the 400 single people it had on its housing list, many of whom are in transitional accommodation, not one was accommodated by the local authority in the past year. Not one person has moved on. Giving people a chance to move on with their lives is supposed to be part of the policy of dealing with the problem of homelessness. The Government has not addressed this. Many local authorities will not house single people because they do not consider they have a duty of care in that respect. The Minister does not even know the number of people who are homeless in his city.
The Government has introduced measures to tackle housing. It implemented a cap on rent allowance. It introduced a measure where people could apply to community welfare officers for finance for the payment of rent for rented accommodation. These are two major measures but, rather than impacting on developers, speculators and others at the top of the scale, they impact on the poor in society.
The way to address the need for social housing is to provide more social housing. The numbers of such houses built suggest that this issue is not on the Government's priority list. We must ask why. The approach is to let the market decide and it will sort out the housing problem, but everyone knows it has not done so. The Government must address it.
I attended a disability conference at which some people said it was great that the Government has a policy on the provision of affordable housing. However, one speaker said that access to an affordable house was a million miles from where that speaker was sitting in a wheelchair and dependent on disability and other social welfare benefits.
The Government must wake up to the realisation that there is a housing crisis and that it must be dealt with. The way to do that is to increase supply.
Anyone would think from the contribution of Members on the Government benches earlier that the Government cared deeply about providing social, local authority and affordable housing. However, that is not the case. The people calling the tune in Fianna Fáil are those developers and builders who profit from the rapid increase in house prices. On the inside of the front cover of the volume prepared to commemorate the 75th anniversary of Fianna Fáil one sees advertisements from Dunloe Ewart, a house builder, and on the side of the back cover, there are advertisements from Treasury Holdings, another house builder. That almost umbilical link between Fianna Fáil and the development lobby must end. Until that happens we will not see a strong or real commitment from Fianna Fáil to providing affordable, social and local authority housing.
At the end of that volume to commemorate 75 years of Fianna Fáil, a rhetorical question is asked. As the unfettered power of 21st century consumerism, devoid of any social conscience or value beyond credit references, seeks global dominance, Ireland faces a truly uncertain future. Can even the practice of politics compete with the allure of branding and the power of the market? I would like to answer that question. If it is left to the politics of Fianna Fáil, the answer is "no", the market will decide.
The wisdom of Fianna Fáil was displayed earlier when speakers said that we need to rezone more land. For God's sake, they need to get real and realise that we must build more houses for people who cannot afford them rather than cave in to the stupid rhetoric of developers who think that zoning more land is the answer. We need to build more local authority and social housing and give more funding to the voluntary housing agencies to enable them to provide more housing. Fianna Fáil has clawed back on the many of the real advances made in recent years. It left Part V of the Planning and Development Act 2000 in shreds. It pulled it apart and left it on the floor. That facilitated developers but not people seeking housing. That appalling, retrograde step was a dark day in Fianna Fáil's commitment to social housing.
The retrograde measures in regard to rent supplement have done the same. We were given a real example at a meeting of the Joint Committee on the Environment and Local Government yesterday of a person with a crisis pregnancy who might move to Dublin. Were she to do so, she would not be able to claim rent supplement until she would be resident here for six months. That is one of the hard cases that must be addressed. The Minister, Deputy Coughlan, has not addressed those cases in the regulations. There are exceptional cases, but the case I outlined is a common one that should be catered for in legislation. Despite this the Government has failed to do that. It has been moving in the wrong direction regarding housing. The output of local authority housing units has fallen behind what was achieved in much less prosperous times.
The Green Party believes that a few other measures are necessary. We need to restore the original provisions of Part V of the Planning and Development Act 2000 which were filleted by the Government, but there are also other measures. The All-Party Oireachtas Committee on the Constitution made excellent recommendations regarding the taxation of development land. The Minster responsible should implement them rather than wait until another generation is barred from the housing market as a result of the increase in house prices. The tax burden should be changed from labour to smarter taxes on the site value of land. That measure in itself would increase affordability of measures.
The Central Bank should be instructed to draw up new guidelines for the lending institutions limiting the amount of money they can lend for house purchases. Things are fine and rosy when times are good, but if interest rates increase, many young people and couples will be left in a dangerous financial position. The Minister has the power and can use it to instruct the Central Bank in this regard.
The Minister could promote environmentally sensitive techniques for building through the building regulations and the planning Acts, yet we do not see much sign of that coming on stream. We want the Minister to ensure that 10,000 social housing units are built every year until the waiting lists are clear. Unless he can deliver on the kinds of promises his party made and that he inserted in the national development plan, we cannot take for real the commitment he pretends to be making towards delivering on housing.
We must get delivery in this regard from the Government. We must restore the decent measures that were taken out of the Planning and Development Act and we must ensure that more housing units are delivered in the right places to ensure that future generations benefit.
I wish to share my time with Deputy Burton.
That is agreed.
There is a housing crisis. If the contents of this motion were implemented, it would solve that problem. There is nothing in the amendment to the motion to give us any confidence in that regard. Housing is a necessity and houses must be provided by the local authorities to give people the security of having their own home.
In my town of Mallow, some 300 people are on the housing waiting list. In the north Cork electoral area, there are 1,200 applicants for local authority housing. The delay in allocating houses is due to the lack of finance by the local authority to repair houses. The cost of providing affordable housing was increased as a result of development charges, known as levies, adopted by the councils. These charges have added to the cost of houses and put affordable houses, beyond the reach of people who should have been able to purchase them. That happened in the north Cork area and I speak about what I know to be factual in that area.
The serviced sites initiative introduced some years ago was a great incentive. Local authorities purchased lands developed the services on sites and then leased them, but that is not happening any more.
It is not right that families should have to live in over-crowded conditions in their parents' homes. Such arrangements, which are creating social problems, are necessary mainly because of the decrease in rent allowance. The cutbacks were outrageous, especially at a time when there is such a shortage of housing. Is it right that parents should have to remortgage their homes to help their children?
The disabled person's and essential repairs grants were suspended for 12 months in the north Cork area and the new house grant was abolished. I assume such major issues will be dealt with if the motion before the House is adopted. I hope it will be accepted.
While the tribunals continue to proceed at a snail's pace, unfortunately fortunes continue to be made at the stroke of a pen. I refer to the pens of those on local authorities who are charged with authorising rezoning. Recent meetings of Fingal County Council have seen an orgy of attempted rezoning of areas of Dublin 15 by the usual rezoning alliance of Fianna Fáil, some Fine Gael councillors and some independent councillors. They are not exerting themselves on behalf of young couples who want to buy a house at an affordable price, but on behalf of the cartel of multi-millionaire builders who control the bulk of the building land in the Fingal area, particularly Dublin 15. I believe that such people have similar holdings elsewhere in the greater Dublin area and in other parts of Leinster.
A respected building economist wrote last year that certain builders are in line to make windfall gains of €300 million in respect of land holdings in north and west Dublin. Recent indications show that he may have significantly underestimated the profits to be made by speculative developers. A young person buying a modest house in the greater Dublin area will pay between €80,000 and €130,000 for the site alone. I refer to a modest property in a housing estate and not to a house on a significant amount of land. The large profit will go to the landowner or the builder-developer. Very little of it is taxed, in effect, as much of the land dealing is based on the principle of option selling. When I raised this phenomenon with the Taoiseach more than a year ago, he acknowledged that it is a major problem in dealing with land speculation. He has done nothing so far, however, to address the scandalous cost of building land and its implications for ordinary house prices.
Communities are being deprived of proper infrastructure, such as schools, community centres, playing fields and public transport because of grotesque speculation on building land, particularly in the greater Dublin area. Communities are regularly held to ransom by builder-developers who offer them a small patch of land for a football pitch if they agree to the construction of another couple of thousand houses in a greenbelt area.
I contrast the role of those who invest in new housing estates with that of owner-occupiers. Builders, developers and investors purchase large numbers of properties in many estates in Dublin 15. Such properties are being let in some cases to highly transient tenants who have little involvement in the development of the local community. Friction and misunderstanding can arise between owner-occupiers and those who are renting because there is little or no regulation of private tenants or landlords. I do not blame those who are renting for such friction. There is "good neighbour" legislation in many countries, including the UK. Landlords are obliged to be properly registered and to look after their properties to a decent standard.
As the Labour Party leader on Fingal County Council, I fought successfully after the 1999 local elections to put in place a significant programme of affordable housing in the area. The 20% affordable housing requirement helped to produce large numbers of fine homes for families on lower incomes in the Fingal area. The abandonment by Fianna Fáil and the Progressive Democrats of the 20% quota must be one of the most reactionary steps undertaken by any Government. Many families that are languishing on council housing lists with little hope of being housed in the next two or four years are paying the price. The reintroduction of a proper affordable housing scheme would take about 50% of such families off the housing list. Who would suffer in such circumstances, other than developers and landowners whose margins on land speculation would be reduced? We are familiar with those to whom Fianna Fáil owes its primary allegiance nowadays.
I would like to share my time with Deputy Rabbitte.
Is that agreed? Agreed.
I welcome the opportunity to discuss this important issue. Several speakers have asserted that it is important that we recognise that there is a housing crisis. How could it be denied? The Minister and the Minister of State have stressed that approximately 70,000 houses were finished last year. That just 4,500 of the houses, approximately, were provided as public housing, however, tells its own story.
I stress a few important basic principles in the short time available to me. Soon the public will have to decide who they want to support and the Government will have to decide which horse it wants to ride. Ní féidir an dá thrá a fhreastal. If we continue as we are, we will make it impossible for the average couple ever to own a house. Over 30% of people in this country are unlikely to be able to provide a home from their own resources. The relevant figure for Dublin is over 50%. Paragraph 1.22 of the Galway city development plan suggests that the relevant figure for that city is 54%. To what kind of country do we want to belong? Do we want to belong to a republic in which people have basic rights, including the right to shelter, the right to housing and the right to education? Alternatively, do we want to belong to some kind of speculative cesspool, with many social poisons?
The housing crisis, which is being denied by the Government, has torn the heart from our economy and, more importantly, our society. Its consequences will be extremely dangerous. People must ask themselves certain questions. How much of one's income should one spend on providing one's housing? How much of both incomes should a couple spend on housing? How much of one's life should one spend paying a mortgage on a totally inflated and speculatively priced house? If one does the basic calculations, one will realise that we are not living in a republic with any of the rights I have mentioned, we are living as mortgage slaves.
People in my city who owned two or three houses five or six years ago are now proud to own more than a dozen houses — some people may own up to 20 houses. As this problem developed, the Government's taxation attitude was to leave untouched the issue of speculative land prices. When one thinks about the cost of a house, one should consider the building costs and the cost of a site. A house that was bought for £97,000 a few years ago may now be worth €300,000. One third of the cost of a house relates to the site costs, which are purely, openly and speculatively established.
The political issue which should be decided on by the Legislature is whether this is an issue for the market or for policy. Sadly, the Government has been captured by the thinking of the Progressive Democrats. It considers that the right to property should take precedence over the right to housing. If we continue to abandon housing to an unchecked and unregulated market, we will drive more people into a limited existence. I do not refer only to the inability of such people to buy a house. Their problems affect the lives of their children and the strength of communities. Many parents who are rearing children do not have a choice about their domestic arrangements. Both of them have to work, not to satisfy the cost of a house, but to satisfy the income of speculators who have been assisted through capital gains tax and who can recycle rental income that is practically tax free to purchase more and more speculative properties. It is outrageous.
Is it a matter of pride that, at a time when the economy was at its most successful, we were building half the number of public sector houses built during the 1980s? In the mid-1980s we were building approximately 8,000 local authority houses per annum. According to the Minister of State's figures, which I accept, it is expected that next year the figure will rise by 500 to reach 5,000 houses, which is half what was being constructed in the 1980s. Let us get real and examine the housing waiting list which, according to the Government, stands at 48,150. The figure could more accurately be put at 60,000. Of that figure, how many are below the income level for affordable housing? How many are on social welfare and how many have any prospect of ever having a house? On the west side of Galway city, where I live, the waiting time for a council house is between six and a half and eight years, according to the local authority. On the north and east sides of the city the delay is from three and a half to four years.
Will the Government address the cost of building land and the unbridled right of speculators to milk the public for every penny in a blood-letting fashion? It is so like the 19th century when we got rid of the landlords, and a new kind of grazer crept in who in turn provoked a confrontation at the end of that century. We are creating a new landlordism in a country that has the name of being a republic.
Our practical proposals set an agenda for action, namely, to implement the recommendations of the all-party report on the price of building land. The Government should make a commitment to double the supply of local authority houses. The concept of affordable housing only has meaning when one examines the proportion of real income one must spend on providing shelter. Those of us in trade unions should bear in mind the Government's broken commitment to the trade union movement to provide 10,000 houses for which not a single brick has been laid.
Local authority candidates are currently swarming around the country like ants saying, "It has nothing to do with us", but it has everything to do with them. Voters should ask Fianna Fáil and Progressive Democrats candidates and canvassers why they voted down the Labour Party's Bill on building land? Why did they vote down our constitutional amendment Bill on the right to shelter? Why did they look after the landlords when we had the private rental commission and failed for four years to produce legislation to protect tenants?
When one mentions prices the Government candidates will say, "But hasn't everything gone up?" House prices have increased by nine times the rate of inflation, five times the rate of increase in average earnings, and four times the rate of increase in the cost of construction. We know where the problem is so we must now choose social, affordable and well-planned housing, as well as the right to live in secure estates. These are matters of public policy. As the Government now acknowledges, there is no constitutional impediment standing in the way of implementing the report on building land, so it should do so. The Government should not, however, describe as a matter of pride the fact that the total amount of housing completions has increased to nearly 70,000, when about half of what we were providing in the 1980s is going to those who cannot afford a house.
What are the consequences of living in a society where, taking rural and urban figures together, one new family in three will never be able to afford a house from their own resources? Half of those in Dublin city will never be able to buy a home. In Galway, according to the local authority's five-year housing strategy figures, 54% cannot expect to purchase a house. The public must now choose between those who would abandon the solution to the marketplace, which in effect is making it worse, and those who seek constitutional, legislative and financial measures to end the housing crisis.
The most depressing aspect of this debate is the complacency on the Government benches. The Government seems to have a genuine difficulty in grasping the fact that we have a housing crisis and that spiralling house prices could lead to a serious economic collapse. The latter point could ultimately prove to be the more important one. If one lives by the conventional laws of economics, as those on the Government benches do, one must accept that there is no example in the world where such constant house price rises have not caused grief. Every time there has been the vaguest suggestion by the Taoiseach that he might consider doing something about it, a new economist appears to tell us that prices are levelling off.
For the past three or four years we have been hearing that the house price spiral has ended, but it is not true. The morning newspapers provide a good idea of why that is so. One must examine the vested interests in maintaining the impetus behind the never-ending spiral of price increases. The big five auctioneers have a vested interest in keeping it going. The newspaper proprietors also have a vested interest because they get wadges of advertising from it, and so the spiral goes on. Pieces of flummery in the newspapers offer great value at indicative prices that we know are nonsensical when it comes to purchasing a home.
Ever since the winter of 1992-93 we have had extraordinary growth in the economy. Initially it was jobless growth and then there was serious growth in employment. Since this problem began to manifest itself towards the end of the 1990s, however, absolutely nothing has been done to intervene and we could yet pay a heavy price for it. Even those who were so complacent on the Government benches have admitted that owning one's own home is now beyond the reach of most young people. With a joint income of less than €100,000 a young couple has no prospect of owning a modest home in this city. It is not too different elsewhere either. As my colleague, Deputy Michael D. Higgins, said, 50% of new families will not be able to own their own home in this city, while the national figure is 33%. That is the kind of crisis we are facing.
Why does it cost €100,000 to build a house, but €300,000 to buy one? What is the answer to that question?
Government tax.
Where is the difference going? I am greatly amused by the fact that the Minister of State, Deputy Noel Ahern, who is present in the House, and the Taoiseach, have promised to carry out yet another study — anything but take action — to discover who owns the land in Fingal. I do not want to be too facetious, but if the Taoiseach asked Deputy Fleming to examine the accounts in Mount Street, he would be able to say who owns the land in Fingal. If the Minister of State asked any of his councillors in Fingal they would tell him who owns the land, right down to the last field. Mr. Jerome Casey did a study on it and has shown who owns the land in Fingal, so how many more studies do we need?
For a couple of years the Taoiseach muttered into his tie, saying he felt there was a constitutional impediment to addressing the price of building land. Since the Government did not want to deal with the problem, it referred the matter to an all-party committee. When the Government wants to get a short-term advantage from an election it runs a referendum immediately without debate or reference to an all-party committee. However the all-party committee bore out the Labour Party submission that there is no constitutional impediment in regard to property rights. If the Minister of State wants to intervene to stabilise the situation in terms of the cost of building land, he can do so.
We do not seek for the bottom to fall out of the market or for negative equity to take effect. Rather, we seek to stabilise the price of housing so that ordinary people can again aspire to owning their own homes and the speculators, who have been running riot for nearly ten years, can be arrested in terms of the enormous profits they have been making.
Amendment put.
The Dáil divided: Tá, 56; Níl, 43.
Tá
- Ahern, Dermot.
- Ahern, Michael.
- Ahern, Noel.
- Ardagh, Seán.
- Brady, Johnny.
- Brady, Martin.
- Callanan, Joe.
- Carey, Pat.
- Carty, John.
- Collins, Michael.
- Cooper-Flynn, Beverley.
- Coughlan, Mary.
- Cregan, John.
- Curran, John.
- Davern, Noel.
- de Valera, Síle.
- Dempsey, Noel.
- Dennehy, John.
- Devins, Jimmy.
- Ellis, John.
- Fleming, Seán.
- Gallagher, Pat The Cope.
- Glennon, Jim.
- Grealish, Noel.
- Hanafin, Mary.
- Haughey, Seán.
- Hoctor, Máire.
- Jacob, Joe.
- Keaveney, Cecilia.
- Kelleher, Billy.
- Killeen, Tony.
- Kitt, Tom.
- Lenihan, Brian.
- McDowell, Michael.
- McEllistrim, Thomas.
- Moloney, John.
- Moynihan, Donal.
- Moynihan, Michael.
- Mulcahy, Michael.
- Nolan, M. J.
- Ó Fearghaíl, Seán.
- O’Connor, Charlie.
- O’Keeffe, Batt.
- O’Keeffe, Ned.
- O’Malley, Fiona.
- O’Malley, Tim.
- Power, Peter.
- Power, Seán.
- Sexton, Mae.
- Smith, Brendan.
- Smith, Michael.
- Treacy, Noel.
- Wallace, Dan.
- Wilkinson, Ollie.
- Woods, Michael.
- Wright, G. V.
Níl
- Breen, Pat.
- Broughan, Thomas P.
- Bruton, Richard.
- Burton, Joan.
- Connolly, Paudge.
- Costello, Joe.
- Crawford, Seymour.
- Crowe, Seán.
- Cuffe, Ciarán.
- Durkan, Bernard J.
- Enright, Olwyn.
- Harkin, Marian.
- Hayes, Tom.
- Higgins, Michael D.
- Hogan, Phil.
- Howlin, Brendan.
- Lynch, Kathleen.
- McCormack, Padraic.
- McGinley, Dinny.
- McGrath, Finian.
- McGrath, Paul.
- McManus, Liz.
- Mitchell, Olivia.
- Murphy, Gerard.
- Naughten, Denis.
- Neville, Dan.
- Noonan, Michael.
- Ó Caoláin, Caoimhghín.
- Ó Snodaigh, Aengus.
- O’Keeffe, Jim.
- O’Shea, Brian.
- O’Sullivan, Jan.
- Pattison, Seamus.
- Penrose, Willie.
- Rabbitte, Pat.
- Ryan, Seán.
- Sargent, Trevor.
- Sherlock, Joe.
- Shortall, Róisín.
- Stagg, Emmet.
- Stanton, David.
- Upton, Mary.
- Wall, Jack.
Tellers: Tá, Deputies Hanafin and Kelleher; Níl, Deputies Stagg and Durkan
Amendment declared carried.
Motion, as amended, put and declared carried.