Dáil Éireann debate -
Wednesday, 19 Mar 2025

Vol. 1064 No. 4

Ceisteanna ó Cheannairí - Leaders' Questions

Deputy Mary Lou McDonald

During the general election campaign, the Taoiseach, along with the Tánaiste, Simon Harris, and his Ministers, repeatedly claimed that 40,000 homes would be delivered in 2024. This was a ploy to fool people into believing that the Government had made real progress on housing. Of course, we all knew it was bull. We now know that, in fact, 30,330 homes were delivered in 2024. That is less than the previous year and far short of the Government's 40,000 election brag - a failure, by the way, that is set to continue, as the Central Bank says the Government will miss its housing targets for the next three years. The Taoiseach and his colleagues cynically misled the public on the key issue of housing during the general election.

When this ploy was exposed last month, the Government's defence was that the claim of 40,000 homes in 2024 was not a promise but a forecast that ended up being wrong - in other words, an honest mistake. Now, however, we have the truth. The Government knew in advance of the general election that it had not a hope of hitting 40,000 new homes for 2024. Just days before the general election was called, then finance Minister and Fianna Fáil deputy leader, Jack Chambers, was handed an important report by the Department of Finance that laid out in black and white that 40,000 homes would not be delivered. Nobody could seriously believe that the Minister would have kept that information from the Government on the eve of an election - it was too important - so I assume he shared it with the Taoiseach. What I know is that the Minister, Deputy Chambers, did not tell the public. On the contrary, two days after receiving this report, with the general election under way, he made the claim that the Government was on course to deliver 40,000 homes. This untruth was repeated by the Taoiseach, by Simon Harris and by Darragh O'Brien again and again throughout the campaign.

It is not lost on anyone that, last week, as the Minister, Deputy Chambers, was caught out for misleading the public at home, the Taoiseach was sitting in the Oval Office laughing about Ireland's housing crisis.

The American President stated that the housing crisis was because Ireland was doing so well and that it was a good problem. The Taoiseach replied: "That's a pretty good answer, Mr. President", but does the Taoiseach think it is a pretty good answer for people locked out of home ownership, renters crucified with rip-off rents and young people unable to get a start in life choosing between staying at home with their parents or going to Australia? Does the Taoiseach think it is a good answer for mothers and fathers forced into homelessness and children being raised in bed and breakfasts and hotel rooms? The Taoiseach's sniggering interaction hurt a lot of people. He made light of their suffering. The Government misleads people on housing at home and then laughs at them while rubbing shoulders with the powerful abroad. Bhí a fhios ag an Rialtas nach raibh ann ach cur i gcéill agus é ag maíomh as 40,000 teach nua in 2024. Ach anois, tá an fhírinne nochtaithe. Does the Taoiseach recognise the hurt caused by his laughing with the American President about the Irish housing crisis? Will he now accept and admit that he knowingly misled the public with his claim the Government would deliver 40,000 homes in 2024?

The Taoiseach

Ní aontaím in aon chor leis an Teachta as ucht an méid a dúirt sí. Níl aon amhras ach gurb é an t-ábhar is tábhachtaí agus is práinní sa tír seo ná cúrsaí tithíochta. An phríomhaidhm atá againn mar Rialtas ná níos mó tithe a chruthú agus é sin a dhéanamh chomh tapa agus is féidir linn. Is é sin bun agus barr pholasaithe an Rialtais. In the first instance, housing is the number one issue in this country. I made the following comment in the Oval Office in the White House. I said: "The number one issue in Ireland is housing". We have got to build more houses and we have got to build them faster to give the young people of Ireland an opportunity to buy a house or to afford to rent a house. It is a pity the Deputy did not quote that in respect of how I addressed the housing issue in a serious and substantive way when I was asked a question during the press conference in the Oval Office. I have consistently said, during previous Government and in this Government, that this is the number one issue. The Deputy will choose to play politics with it on an ongoing basis. She chose not to go to Washington D.C. That was a big mistake in my view. She chose not to face or meet people to discuss a whole range of issues she will habitually raise in this House, and did not have the courage or the guts to go to the US and meet her own interlocutors-----

(Interruptions).

The Taoiseach

-----and discuss those issues with them. On the housing issue, if I could comment for a moment, there were several projections throughout 2024 in respect of completions. We have exceeded targets, particularly in 2022 and 2023. We exceeded Central Bank targets and other targets that suggested we would come in lower. That is the position. The first quarter of the following year is when the statistics come in. There are a variety of publications and data was published in September by the Central Bank and others, but the Central Bank had come in lower in previous years. The Deputy knows that EY-Euroconstruct and others were predicting far higher numbers. It was extremely disappointing that we did not make those targets in 2024. The overall Housing for All targets were exceeded in that three-year period, but that is not enough. We have to build more houses and we have to build them faster. The focus has to be on how we do that and how we get from 30,000 plus houses a year being built to 50,000 houses a year being built. I have yet to hear anything credible from the Deputy in respect of that challenge. When people make suggestions, as I have, in terms of the need for more private sector investment to go into housing, they get attacked in a knee-jerk fashion without any space or room for a meaningful or substantive debate on the issues or the modalities by which we can get 50,000 houses built a year. This is what the ESRI is saying we need in terms of demographic pressures. In other words, our population is increasing and more and more houses will need to be built.

All the parties in this House agree on the demand side of the targets. I do not think there is big disagreement as to whether it is 50,000 or a variation of that which we require per annum over the next five years. We have a clear programme in terms of Government investment, which is the largest historically. We built more houses in the past three years than since the early 2000s. We built more social housing in the past three years, You would have to go back to the 1970s to get the same scale of social housing new builds in this country, as well as provision. We will continue to focus on that in terms of the delivery of social and affordable housing. We also need to get more private sector investment involved.

Deputy Mary Lou McDonald

The Taoiseach is spoofing. The Department of Finance analysed all the available data which the Taoiseach cited and more. The Department told the Taoiseach's colleague, the Minister, Jack Chambers, that 40,000 homes in 2024 was not happening. We have the documentation to reflect that fact. The Minister knew and the Government knew - I assume the Taoiseach knew - yet the Government spun the fiction again and again of 40,000 houses in 2024 to, as it were, take the bad look off things. Shame on you for doing that and for misleading people.

It does not take courage to snigger at people. That is the action of an obsequious coward. It is a cowardly act to snigger at the suffering and hardship of people back home when you feel you are at a safe distance to do so.

An Leas-Cheann Comhairle

Thank you, Deputy McDonald.

Deputy Mary Lou McDonald

I ask the Taoiseach to reflect on that and on the fact that his sniggering-----

An Leas-Cheann Comhairle

Thank you, Deputy, please. The Taoiseach to respond.

Deputy Mary Lou McDonald

-----caused real hurt. The Taoiseach should genuinely reflect on that fact. Perhaps he has not. I now ask him to do so and accept also that he misled people in the general election campaign.

The Taoiseach

I think that is pathetic. The Deputy accuses me of spoofing? Get off the stage. No one was sniggering at any housing problem. The Deputy knows that.

Deputy Louise O'Reilly

We saw you.

The Taoiseach

It is pathetic - the protestation and the Deputy's attempt to exploit that particular moment, completely oblivious and refusing to reference the actual substance of what I said in terms of housing being the number one priority in Ireland. The Deputy can criticise our policies as a Government but she should not try to say she has a monopoly of concern or empathy on the housing question. Everybody in this House knows it through our own communities and the people we represent that this is the number one issue. No one will buy into Sinn Féin's propaganda, its feigned outrage and its feigned protestation. The bottom line is Sinn Féin did not go to Capitol Hill even though in other years it asked the Government of the day to advocate on its behalf, which we did-----

An Leas-Cheann Comhairle

Please conclude, Taoiseach.

The Taoiseach

-----on many an occasion for Sinn Féin, but when it comes to putting the party fist as opposed to the country first, Sinn Féin will always put the party first.

(Interruptions).

The Taoiseach

That is why Deputy McDonald did not go to the US-----

Deputy Pearse Doherty

The Government misled the public at the general election.

The Taoiseach

On spurious grounds, she did not go to the US.

An Leas-Cheann Comhairle

Thank you, Taoiseach.

The Taoiseach

No one is convinced-----

Deputy Pearse Doherty

Did the Minister, Deputy Chambers, tell the Taoiseach?

The Taoiseach

-----about your false assertions.

An Leas-Cheann Comhairle

Deputy Bacik, please.

Deputy Ivana Bacik

They say every day is a school day. While the Dáil rose last week, we all learned something new. We all thought we knew why we had a housing crisis in this country - the number one issue facing this country, as the Taoiseach just said. We thought we had a housing crisis because of the Government’s policies and flat refusal to restrict evictions and stop families falling into homelessness. We thought it was because of the Government's failure to raise building targets, weak enforcement measures to tackle vacancy and dereliction and its ill-conceived planning Act, apparently drafted for and by developers. We all thought these were causal factors of the housing crisis, but after watching the Taoiseach's bilateral press conference with US President Trump last week, we all were surprised to learn that, in fact, these systemic failures were not the root causes of the housing crisis. The spiralling rents, unaffordable house prices and, shamefully, rising record figures in homelessness are apparently because we are doing so well. “That’s a good problem, not a bad problem", in the words of President Trump. The Taoiseach might clarify if it is a view he shares because in reply, he said: "That’s a pretty good answer, Mr. President".

I am sure that is not the response he would give the Irish people today. In fairness, I will acknowledge that he did go on to elaborate that we have to build more houses and we have to build them more quickly. We all agree with that but what we are not seeing from his Government is any sign of the necessary urgency or ambition or any new ideas that would actually enable us to build more homes more quickly. In today's quarterly bulletin from the Central Bank the forecasts for housing completions are revised down again. The report calls on the Government to build at scale, implement modern methods of construction, incentivise use of available land to build homes and deliver public infrastructure and a more effective planning regime. We have heard these calls before from the Taoiseach's very own Housing Commission, apart from anywhere else. Indeed, his party claimed that those policy objectives would be delivered on through what we now know to be the Government's failed Housing for All plan and through the Planning and Development Act, the most verbose missed opportunity in the history of the State. Under those initiatives things have got worse, not better.

This Government and the previous one have been moving at a snail's pace on housing. It is more than a year since the Government accepted that our ambition for at least 50,000 new-build homes per year would be needed to house the population but still it is working towards old targets and not even meeting them. Indeed, in the general election campaign, the Taoiseach and his Ministers actively misled the public on the figures for housing completions. We now know this. The Taoiseach spoke of propaganda but what we heard from his Government during the general election campaign was propaganda on housing that had no basis in fact. What we now need are new ideas and some urgency. Will the Taoiseach work with us in the Labour Party? We have constructive ideas. For example, our housing solidarity bond would redirect private investment into the building of homes using the money held on deposit in banks around the country. The Central Bank tells us the value of savings is higher than ever. Will the Taoiseach take on board new ideas that would actually enable us to build more homes more quickly and give our young people hope for the future?

The Taoiseach

I am always open to new ideas, to concrete and substantive ideas. I was not particularly impressed with what the Labour Party put forward in the general election campaign. Establishing a new national building agency would have only delayed things. It would take years to establish and it is a kind of rowing the clock back to earlier eras and to models that simply would not work now in terms of where we are with regard to house construction models, builders and so on. I do not see people in the construction sector flocking to be employees of a national building agency, not to mention the legislation that would be required to establish it, and so on. The Labour Party lacked conviction and even when I met Deputy Bacik afterwards in the context of formation of government talks, there was no fleshing out of its policies-----

Deputy Ivana Bacik

Yes there was.

The Taoiseach

There was no clear blueprint, no paper in respect of how this agency was going to be established.

Deputy Ivana Bacik

It is in our manifesto.

The Taoiseach

If the Deputy has other ideas, that is fine, but they have to be focused on getting more houses built and getting them built faster, which I have said consistently over the last while.

From about 2020 onwards about 130,000 new homes were built, which is more than anything in the previous decade or more. Momentum did switch. There was a turn and a significant shift in momentum in terms of house construction but given the population growth in this country, which has been quite significant over the last decade or a half, we need to build more homes and we need to build them faster. This Government is two months in office, essentially-----

Deputy Peadar Tóibín

It is in office since 2016.

The Taoiseach

Two and a bit months-----

Deputy Conor Sheehan

Almost ten years.

The Taoiseach

It is two months in office, despite Deputies' best efforts. An extra €800 million on top of the outturn last year has been allocated to housing. There is €450 million for 3,000 new homes and also funding to fund substantial numbers of tenant in situ homes under that particular programme. The State's investment is enormous relative to historic norms in respect of housing in this country. That is why I am saying that parallel with that, there simply has to be a greater degree of private sector investment. If we look at the fall off last year, apartment block building is a huge area of concern. Deputy Bacik criticised the planning Act which took about three years to get through this House, despite all of the pre-legislative scrutiny and all the rest of it. It is the most substantive and important piece of legislation to enable us to streamline planning decisions and planning timelines through the new planning commission. As well as that, the national planning framework is key to zoning more land so that we can get more houses built more quickly.

This is a very important piece of work that we will roll out. The Government will approve this very shortly.

An Leas-Cheann Comhairle

Thank you, Taoiseach.

The Taoiseach

Obviously the county councils and the city councils will then have to adopt and change their plans to allow for more zoning to allow more houses to be constructed.

Deputy Ivana Bacik

The Taoiseach says he is open to new ideas on housing but every time anyone in opposition raises a new idea with him he never misses an opportunity to denigrate it and belittle it.

Deputy Conor Sheehan

Hear, hear.

Deputy Ivana Bacik

As he well knows, the Labour Party's proposal clearly set out in our manifesto was to scale up the existing Land Development Agency, which we have supported in opposition, in order to ensure the State could bear the risk of building upfront. What I am hearing from builders and developers throughout the country is they desperately need upfront financing and that the absence of that is what is causing the downward trend and the drop in momentum in the construction of apartments and houses. The Taoiseach says momentum is with him but it is not. I am looking at the Central Bank's report today. The wording in it is about downward momentum and a projected drop in completions because the financing is not there. The Labour Party is offering the Taoiseach a constructive proposal to develop a new financing model through a housing solidarity bond. The Taoiseach has not even responded to my question about it.

An Leas-Cheann Comhairle

The Deputy's time has concluded.

Deputy Ivana Bacik

With respect, people will take with a large pinch of salt the Taoiseach's claim to be willing and open to taking up new ideas to deliver more homes more quickly. People see for themselves that homes are not being delivered by the Government, nor were they by the previous Government.

The Taoiseach

I would appreciate if Deputy Bacik would send me a paper on the housing solidarity bond. It is a headline at the moment but if she can send me a paper on it we will examine it. Effectively, through the CREL initiative, for example, and the LDA has effectively been upfronting the financing of a lot of private sector housing. That is de facto what is happening right now through the LDA.

Deputy Ivana Bacik

Scale it up.

The Taoiseach

There is an issue with the cost of financing but the State cannot be the first and last bank of resort in respect of house construction. Probably up to €7 billion and more this year is the totality of State spending on housing.

Deputy Ivana Bacik

It is how it is spent.

The Taoiseach

Whatever way we look at it, we do have to look at the cost of financing and I have mentioned here that the commercial banks have to do more in respect of lending at sustainable rates to builders to build in the private sector. We will continue to focus on that work.

An Leas-Cheann Comhairle

I must ask the Taoiseach to conclude.

The Taoiseach

As of now the State is already in the space of facilitating acting as a catalyst in terms of the private sector, with State underpinning essentially or back up.

Deputy Cian O'Callaghan

The Taoiseach was asked a simple question, which he did not answer. Did the Minister for Finance share with him the analysis from the Department of Finance that the 40,000 homes claim was not going to materialise last year? Did he share that analysis with the Taoiseach before the election date? The Taoiseach might answer this question because he has been asked twice and he has not answered it. The Taoiseach promised that 40,000 homes would be delivered last year, and we know that just 30,300 homes were delivered. Last week we learned that the number of planning permissions collapsed by almost 22% in 2024. Today the Central Bank is telling us the Government will miss its housing targets for the next three years. We also learned today that house prices have increased by 8.1% over the past year. Instead of accepting responsibility for this during these questions, what we have heard from the Taoiseach today is spin, bluster, deflection and accusing the Opposition of engaging in propaganda, when he is the one who told the electorate that 40,000 homes would be delivered last year.

Deputy Mary Lou McDonald

Hear, hear.

Deputy Cian O'Callaghan

There is now a mountain of evidence that Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael deliberately misrepresented housing delivery figures during the election. The Taoiseach cannot continue to deny it. This is a Comical Ali routine he is playing in pretending it was somehow an honest mistake. Not content with massaging last year's figures, the targets for this year are now being clearly reverse engineered. When the Taoiseach was asked by RTÉ in February about housing targets for this year, he dodged the question. He would not give an answer on housing targets for this year. In advance of the election, he was very clear on housing targets, as was Fine Gael. He said this year's target was 41,000 homes. Are we now to understand that this figure is not worth the paper it is written on? Does the Taoiseach think that people will forget the commitments he made just a few months ago?

The reality is that the Taoiseach's Government has been found out and his housing plan is not working.

Housing is about more than bricks and mortar; it is about independence and security. It is about starting a family and putting roots down in a community. There are now tens of thousands of people throughout Ireland who are missing out on this. They are people who feel disconnected from society and forgotten by government, and who feel that their lives are passing them by.

There are solutions to the housing crisis. We have put forward many. For example, we proposed the introduction of affordable housing zoning. The Government voted this proposal down. We proposed early-stage finance to get affordable housing projects off the ground. The Government has not taken up this proposal. Can the Taoiseach level with us now and confirm the Government's housing target for this year is 41,000 homes? Does he accept that it is not going to meet that target, and what radical measures is he going to take to ensure we build the amount of affordable homes needed?

The Taoiseach

The Deputy attacks because the target last year was not met. When the target was exceeded in 2022 and 2023, the Deputy's line was that the targets were not high enough. No matter what target gets set in here, the Deputy will always find a way to say that the Government is either not setting a target high enough, or if it exceeds it, it clearly did not set it high enough, and so forth. Now the Deputy wants me to set a target two months into the year again so that he can have another go at the setting of targets.

Deputy Cian O'Callaghan

The Taoiseach set the target a few months ago.

The Taoiseach

My focus now, fundamentally, is to work on a whole set of policies that can get us more houses built faster for young people in particular, so that they can afford to either buy or rent homes. There is a range of issues we have to examine in that regard and continue to develop. As I said, we have already allocated an additional €800 million in respect of housing in the first two to three months of this Government, over and above what was allocated, to get more housing through.

The Deputy referenced planning permissions. Planning permission was granted for about 32,000 new homes last year. That is 21% down on the previous year but interestingly, while there was about 3% of a reduction in houses, the big dip was in apartments - 39% in apartment permissions compared with the previous years. I have said in here from day one of this new Government that this is an issue which, collectively, has to be looked at. I said we have to work on methods and ways of getting the private sector involved, particularly in brownfield sites.

Of course, what the Deputy and others did was just grab it and go off on a propaganda spin saying, "He is going to increase rents or do this and that", none of which I said. I never said any of it. It did not stop the Deputy from saying that is what I said. We need to look at it, and we need to look at how we create an investment climate that will draw in additional private sector investment to at least come up somewhere close to, and parallel with, what the State is investing in social housing.

In 2023, planning permissions went up 21%. You are looking at a very high level in 2023; that came down significantly in 2024. Obviously, we want it to continue to go up. In the past five years alone, 119,000 first-time buyer mortgages have been drawn down. That is in the past five years to the end of 2024. Fundamentally, there has been far greater access to first-time homes and so on over the last number of years because of the significant increase, where we did go from 20,000 per annum in 2020 up to around 30,000-plus in 2022, 2023 and 2024. We need to get up much higher. We want to get to 41,000 this year. It is going to be very challenging; there is no easy answer to that, and again-----

An Leas-Cheann Comhairle

Deputy O'Callaghan to conclude.

Deputy Cian O'Callaghan

The Taoiseach told the electorate a few months ago that the housing target for this year was 41,000 homes. Is he now saying that target is gone? Is he now saying that he has no housing target for 2025? What is the Government's housing target for 2025? The Taoiseach was explicitly clear a few months ago with the electorate that it was 41,000 homes. Is that still his target or has he ditched it? Why is he refusing to answer questions about what the Government's housing target is for 2025?

Second, there is that question the Taoiseach has now been asked three times but he has not answered. Did the Minister for Finance give the Taoiseach that information from the Department of Finance that the Government's housing completion projections of 40,000 homes were not going to happen? Did he give the Taoiseach that information before the election day? Is the Taoiseach going to answer that question? He has dodged it three times; this is his fourth time. Will he answer that question?

Deputy Mary Lou McDonald

Hear, hear.

The Taoiseach

First of all, the 41,000 remains a target.

Deputy Louise O'Reilly

It is a simple question.

The Taoiseach

Just on the issue-----

Deputies

Answer the question.

The Taoiseach

I am answering it. I am going to answer-----

A Deputy

"Yes" or "No".

The Taoiseach

On the data the Deputy is talking about, the Central Bank published the September figures-----

Deputy Pearse Doherty

No.

The Taoiseach

Hold on a second-----

Deputy Pearse Doherty

It is a Department assessment that was confidential until last week.

The Taoiseach

Deputy Doherty is not answering the question. Sit down.

An Leas-Cheann Comhairle

Deputy Doherty, please.

Deputy Pearse Doherty

Do not mislead the Dáil.

An Leas-Cheann Comhairle

Deputy Doherty, please allow the Taoiseach to respond.

The Taoiseach

I am not misleading the Dáil at all.

Deputy Mary Lou McDonald

You are.

An Leas-Cheann Comhairle

I did not say that.

The Taoiseach

Deputy Doherty did.

Deputy Pearse Doherty

You are. It was a confidential Department assessment-----

Deputy Gary Gannon

Answer the Social Democrats' question.

Deputy Pearse Doherty

-----that was given to the Minister, Deputy Jack Chambers two days before the general election. The question was whether the Taoiseach knew.

An Leas-Cheann Comhairle

Allow the Taoiseach to answer, please.

Deputy Mary Lou McDonald

Yes, if he will.

The Taoiseach

The fundamental point I am making is that the figures the Deputy is making a big song and dance about were published, not by the Department of Finance, but by the Central Bank in September. The Deputy and I knew them, but we had other figures saying they would be higher. The Central Bank-----

Deputy Pearse Doherty

No.

An Leas-Cheann Comhairle

Deputy Doherty, please.

The Taoiseach

Deputy Doherty was not asking the question. It was the Social Democrats.

Deputy Pearse Doherty

The Department's assessment is the question that was asked.

An Leas-Cheann Comhairle

Deputy Doherty, please.

The Taoiseach

The point I am trying to make to the Deputy is there were different estimates and so on about targets.

Deputy Pearse Doherty

No.

The Taoiseach

The previous year, the Central Bank underestimated what we would increase by.

A Deputy

The Department's assessment-----

Deputy Pearse Doherty

Only one assessment.

The Taoiseach

In terms of the individual summaries Ministers get, many were referring to the Central Bank's reports.

Deputy Mary Lou McDonald

No.

The Taoiseach

Others were referring to EUROCONSTRUCT-----

Deputy Pearse Doherty

The Department's assessment was a confidential document handed to-----

The Taoiseach

The bottom line is this-----

An Leas-Cheann Comhairle

Deputy Doherty.

Deputy Pearse Doherty

-----the Minister, Deputy Chambers, two days before the general election and he kept it from the public-----

The Taoiseach

-----the only way you ultimately find out is in the first quarter of the following year.

Deputy Pearse Doherty

You will not even tell us whether you were told about it.

The Taoiseach

The first quarter of the following year, you get the data.

Deputy Pearse Doherty

Did you know?

The Taoiseach

In previous years, people said we would not reach our targets.

Deputy Mary Lou McDonald

No, you are spoofing.

The Taoiseach

We actually exceeded them. Some of the estimates, even from official circles, were wrong-----

Deputy Cian O'Callaghan

Answer the question.

Deputy Pearse Doherty

Did you know?

The Taoiseach

-----for the previous year. There was no-----

An Leas-Cheann Comhairle

Deputy Doherty.

Deputy Pearse Doherty

Did you know, Taoiseach?

The Taoiseach

I repeat this-----

Deputy Pearse Doherty

Did you know of the Department's assessment?

The Taoiseach

There was no attempt to knowingly mislead the people on any of this.

Deputy Pearse Doherty

Did you know about the Department's assessment?

The Taoiseach

We have worked extremely hard on the housing question. It is our number one priority. It will remain our number one priority.

Deputy Pearse Doherty

Did you know of the Department's assessment?

An Leas-Cheann Comhairle

Thank you, Taoiseach.

A Deputy

Answer the question.

The Taoiseach

The focus has to be on how we get those numbers.

Deputy Pearse Doherty

Did you deliberately mislead the public?

An Leas-Cheann Comhairle

I call Deputy Peadar Tóibín.

Deputy Peadar Tóibín

Most Garda divisions now have fewer front-line officers than this time last year. That is a shocking headline currently throughout the country. In the 560 Garda stations that exist, the number has fallen from 12,045 gardaí to 11,928 gardaí. In County Waterford, the number of gardaí has fallen by 24. In counties Louth, Cavan and Monaghan, the number of gardaí has fallen by 48. In counties Roscommon and Longford, the number of gardaí has fallen by 22. In Meath, my own county and the county with the lowest number of gardaí per capita in the State, the number of gardaí in our division has fallen again. In actual, real terms, the Garda numbers have fallen below 2020 figures. They have actually fallen in real terms below 2009 figures. Believe it or not, per capita, we have a lower number of gardaí now than we had 20 years ago in 2005, which is an incredible situation. Under Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael, Ireland now has its lowest number of gardaí in 20 years per capita. That is on the basis that Ireland also has the lowest number of gardaí per capita in the whole of the European Union. It is an incredible situation where police forces across Europe have far more police per capita than Ireland.

Rural Garda stations have been closed and that has done an enormous level of damage across the country. The refusal by the Government to staff those Garda stations is actually leaving those communities exposed to crime. It is a competitive advantage to criminals that the Taoiseach's party and Fine Gael have closed Garda stations around the country. In my own county, Ballivor, Longwood, Summerhill, Athboy and Oldcastle all have Garda stations that are hardly open at the moment. These are typical of many other towns throughout the country that have been abandoned by the Government to crime. These towns had functional Garda stations 100 years ago, when this State did not have a shilling to rub together and when crime was about a quarter of what it is now. Now, more gardaí are resigning, retiring and being attacked on a daily basis than ever before.

Drew Harris has lost the dressing room. There is a universal lack of confidence in Drew Harris among gardaí, and this is leading to a substantial increase in crime. Burglaries are increasing at a serious rate. Violent burglaries are increasing. A person's property is being broken into every 50 minutes in this country. Theft offences, kidnappings, firearms, explosives offences, public order offences, violent crime, attempted murders, assaults, shootings, drug importations and arson attacks are all increasing at the moment. This is the Taoiseach's Ireland at the moment.

Will the Government invest in real terms in Garda pay and conditions? Will it reopen the many Garda stations that have been closed? A total of 56 Garda stations do not even have an assigned garda. One would think that having a garda would be a key component to a Garda station, yet we do not have this. Will the Taoiseach reopen those Garda stations and make sure that they are properly staffed?

The Taoiseach

I pay tribute to An Garda Síochána and its members for the outstanding work they do in a much more complex society than in previous decades in protecting our citizens and working with our citizens every day of every week. They do exceptional work. Our overall Garda workforce is larger than it has ever been. I know the Deputy slipped in the per capita number. It is the highest it has ever been. During Covid, with the closure of Templemore and so on, there was a subsequent delay in recruitment to An Garda Síochána. The latest recruitment campaign was hugely successful in that it attracted approximately 6,700 applications. Our objective is to get as many gardaí on the street as we can. The Minister for Justice, Deputy O'Callaghan, is working with the Garda Commissioner on that. If we take the Garda workforce in its entirety-----

Deputy Peadar Tóibín

That is not gardaí.

The Taoiseach

-----it is at approximately 18,000 as we speak. The budget was increased by €500 million last year. That is a 27% increase in the Garda budget since 2020. On another day, Deputy Tóibín will come in speaking about value for money, wasteful Government expenditure and all of that. No one can question the fact that very substantial resources have been allocated, far above what would normally be the annual increase in Government expenditure. We need to be conscious of that as well, particularly as we enter potentially more economically turbulent times. The Garda budget this year is €2.48 billion, which is a huge sum. We have increased the Garda training allowance to €354 per week. The age of entry has increased from 35 to 50. The mandatory retirement age has gone to 62. The Minister, Deputy O'Callaghan, has continued his substantial discussions with the Commissioner about how we can further improve recruitment. The current capacity in Templemore is approximately 800 a year. The target is 5,000 over the next five years. We will have to increase training capacity to achieve that target and we are committed to doing that.

A new group was established to achieve that and to make sure we can reach those figures. It has been formed and is finalising its report, which is expected in mid-2025, which will recommend a series of actions to take to enable us to get the increase of 5,000 that we require. All effort is being made to increase recruitment.

Regarding deployment, the Deputy may be aware of the report today on public order policing. There is a substantial increase and expansion of capacity in that area, which is to be welcomed. There is much better resourcing of An Garda Síochána in that sphere over the past year or so. I am hopeful and have a better, more positive disposition than the Deputy has, obviously, about the future of An Garda Síochána and our capacity as a State to provide resources.

Deputy Peadar Tóibín

The Taoiseach has a more positive disposition than anybody living in those towns without a Garda station, in reality. The Garda Inspectorate report on public order policing that he mentioned was published seven years ago. I have asked numerous Ministers for Justice if the recommendations of that report have been implemented. Three months after I asked the former Minister for Justice, Deputy Helen McEntee if they had been implemented, I got an answer to a parliamentary question, which stated that she did not know the answer to that and would give the answer when she could. I asked the same question of the new Minister for Justice, who came back to me in the past month. He said, seven years after they were published, that the Department is considering the recommendations. It is an incredible situation. If those recommendations had been implemented, we could have mitigated against the worst damage of the Dublin riots and their massive costs, not just in the financial cost to the taxpayer but the massive cost to our international reputation and the damage done.

We do not have a specific public order unit.

An Leas-Cheann Comhairle

Deputy Tóibín, please conclude your question.

Deputy Peadar Tóibín

Gardaí are taken out of Garda stations and put into a public order unit for a period.

An Leas-Cheann Comhairle

Deputy Tóibín, resume your seat please.

Deputy Peadar Tóibín

When will the Government implement the recommendations of the Garda Inspectorate report in full?

The Taoiseach

There was a Garda Inspectorate report in respect of domestic abuse published earlier today. The Deputy has a habit of going back-----

Deputy Peadar Tóibín

I am talking about the 2019 Garda Inspectorate report that the Taoiseach mentioned.

The Taoiseach

I mentioned a public order report. The Minister today updated the Cabinet on the progress we have made in terms of public order units, public order resources and a suite of improvements that have happened.

Deputy Peadar Tóibín

They have not been implemented.

The Taoiseach

They have.

Deputy Peadar Tóibín

No.

An Leas-Cheann Comhairle

Order, please, Deputy Tóibín.

The Taoiseach

I will ask the Minister to brief the Deputy after the session on the progress that has been made.

Deputy Peadar Tóibín

He has briefed me in response to a parliamentary question.

The Taoiseach

It has been significant, and so it should be.

Deputy Peadar Tóibín

You are mistaken.

The Taoiseach

The Deputy mentioned the Dublin riots. Again, we should always be conscious that we are not alone in this. I and four of my Ministers met with the British Prime Minister the week before last at the annual summit. Events that are happening now are triggered by how certain people behave, outside the House, obviously, in terms of provocateurs or whatever. I refer to people who are determined to exploit certain situations in order to create riots, a very negative and violent reaction and so forth.

Deputy Peadar Tóibín

Will you implement it?

An Leas-Cheann Comhairle

The Taoiseach's time has concluded.

The Taoiseach

The exact same thing happened in the United Kingdom, with, as the Deputy knows, a devastating impact on particular towns. We have to be very vigilant about that and we have to protect gardaí. One of the most important things that we are keen on doing is accessing legislation in terms of facial recognition and the use of modern technological techniques and capacity, which some of the House, of course, opposes. If we had that capacity, I think we would improve our responses to events like the Dublin rioting to make sure that people are prosecuted faster and held to account much faster than they were, perhaps, prior to this.