Dáil Éireann díospóireacht -
Thursday, 21 Sep 2023

Vol. 1042 No. 4

Affordable Housing: Motion [Private Members]

Deputy Cian O'Callaghan

I move:

That Dáil Éireann:

notes that:

— the cost of buying a home has increased by more than 25 per cent since this Government came into office;

— it now costs almost €330,000 on average to buy a home, an increase of more than €66,000 since 2020 and €90,000 since 2017;

— the median income for first-time buyers of new homes is now more than €90,000 and more than €103,000 in Dublin;

— there are more than 520,000 adults living in their childhood bedrooms, a 14 per cent rise since 2016, and a 19 per cent increase since Fine Gael took office in 2011;

— the rate of home ownership is continuing to decline and is at a 30-year low;

— the share of 25-34 year-olds who own their own home more than halved between 2004 and 2019, falling from 60 per cent to just 27 per cent; and

— rent prices are at record highs, having more than doubled in a decade and having increased by more than 20 per cent since this Government took office;

acknowledges that:

— a lack of affordable housing is forcing adults to live at home, which can have a negative impact on mental health, self-esteem, employment prospects, the ability to form and maintain relationships and connection to communities;

— a lack of affordable housing is having a negative impact on the economy, resulting in staffing shortages across the public and private sectors;

— these staffing shortages are particularly acute when it comes to teachers, nurses, Gardaí and other important public sector workers in urban areas; and

— a lack of affordable housing is forcing students to defer college places or change third-level education plans;

further notes that:

— zero affordable purchase homes were delivered in 2020;

— zero affordable purchase homes were delivered in 2021;

— just 323 affordable purchase homes were delivered in 2022;

— the Government missed its target for the delivery of affordable purchase and Cost Rental homes by 70 per cent in 2022;

— the Minister for Housing, Local Government and Heritage failed to spend €1 billion of his capital budget between 2020 and 2022; and

— adult homelessness has increased by more than 40 per cent since this Government took office and child homelessness is up by 44 per cent; and

calls on the Government to:

— publish figures for the delivery of affordable homes in 2023;

— increase the target for affordable purchase and Cost Rental homes to 10,000 homes per year;

— introduce a punitive tax on vacancy;

— reinstate the ban on no-fault evictions to protect renters from homelessness; and

— stop investing public money in the delivery of private rental-only developments that are unaffordable to rent and unavailable to buy.

There are 12,847 people who are living in homeless emergency accommodation; 12,847 people. Every single person contained in that figure is an individual with their own dreams and their own aspirations. It is individuals with hopes for the future who never thought they would be without a home. These are 12,847 individuals, each with their own story to tell. I will speak shortly about one of these people and their recent experience of being homeless.

Within that figure of 12,847 people, 181 are pensioners; 181. Can any of us imagine what it would be like when we are older, or when we retire, to be without a home? Could any of us imagine what it be like if our parents were in that situation or for anyone in that stage of life to be without a home? There are 3,829 children who are growing up without a home; 3,829. The highest number of people in the history of this country are living in homeless emergency accommodation. Every month, a new record on that is set. Yet somehow, the Government thinks its housing strategy is working and that more of the same is somehow going to work and that it is somehow acceptable. It simply is not.

There are more than 500,000 adults in their 20s, 30s and 40s who are still living in their childhood bedrooms, while many more are paying extortionate rents. Home ownership under this Government is at its lowest level in more than 50 years. At the same time as record levels of homelessness, record rent levels, record levels of people in their 20s, 30s and 40s living in their childhood bedrooms, there is actually record levels of underspending in the housing budget under this Government. Hundreds of millions of euro has been allocated to housing. That could and should have been used to build housing to lift people out of homelessness and out of the threat of homelessness, but it was left unspent. Hundreds of millions of euro was returned to the Exchequer after money was carried over into this year's budget from last year, because the maximum amount was carried over. Hundreds of millions of euro was actually returned the Exchequer unspent when it should have been spent to help lift people out of this housing disaster. How is it possible in the middle of a housing disaster that such a high level of money could be returned to the Exchequer because it was unspent?

Fine Gael and Fianna Fáil are miserably failing to get to grips with this housing crisis, which is of their own making. This is having devastating consequences for people all over Ireland. We need change. The motion that we in the Social Democrats are putting forward contains a number of practical steps that, if implemented now by the Government, would help bring housing solutions to thousands of people who are struggling to find an affordable place to live. In this motion we are calling for the Government to build 10,000 affordable purchase and affordable rental homes per year, to bring in a tax on vacancy that actually has teeth, that is effective and strong, and to immediately reinstate the ban on no-fault evictions.

Let us be very clear; the lifting of the eviction ban has been nothing short of a disaster. There are record levels of people who are homeless as a result. It is the highest number in the history of the State. Homelessness has been rising for 18 out of the past 19 months. The only month in which it fell during that time was at the tail end of the eviction ban when it was starting to work. The Government’s decision to lift the eviction ban has caused the number of people becoming homeless to rise again. Some 859 people have become homeless since the eviction ban was lifted and 357 of them are children. There has been a 7% increase in homelessness in the few months since the eviction ban was lifted and a 10% increase in the number of children who are homeless since the eviction ban was lifted. A new record level of homelessness has been set for 12 out of the 13 last months. The ESRI report, which was published this week, provides evidence of why we need the eviction ban to be reinstated. It shows that renters in new tenancies are paying more than €200 per month per tenancy than existing renters. It shows that rent regulation measures are not working effectively. It shows that when renters are evicted and receive a notice to quit, they are replaced with new renters and many landlords in those situations, although not all, are circumventing the rent regulation rules and using those evictions to get new renters at higher rents. The ESRI report has solid, hard evidence of that and shows that in order to protect renters we need to reinstate the no-fault ban on evictions. That would prevent renters who pay their rent from being evicted.

It is worth saying that all that would bring us in line with most European countries where renters who pay their rent are not subject to eviction. That is the norm in most European countries. The human cost of the housing disaster cannot be overstated. The impact on the more than 500,000 people who are still living in their childhood bedrooms is huge. It has impacts on mental health, wellbeing, independence, family formation and relationships. These are the impacts of the housing disaster. Talk to any school principal and they will tell you they can spend months trying to fill a teaching post, only for it then to fall at the last hurdle because the person they have recruited cannot take up the post because they cannot find somewhere affordable to live. One of the biggest issues facing local authorities now is their ability to fill the posts and recruit staff, especially in urban areas. We are seeing this in disability services, where children can be waiting for years just to get an assessment. We are seeing difficulty in filling posts because of the housing disaster. Effectively, we are seeing a hollowing out of areas, especially urban areas, where people in critical roles such as teachers, gardaí, disability services, local authority staff and lots of other sectors simply cannot afford to live there and are being pushed out. If you look at where the Government’s increases to the housing supply are coming from, many of them are build-to-rent schemes. These are rental-only, and people do not have the option to buy or the option of home ownership.

I want to talk about an issue I raised with the Minister earlier today, which is the experience of one homeless person. There are more than 12,000 people who are living in emergency accommodation, but I will raise the recent experience of one of them. I know this is not representative of all people who are living in homeless emergency accommodation. However, there are other people who are in privately run homeless emergency accommodation and who have had similar experiences. I have been raising this issue with the Minister consistently for the last number of years. While conditions are not perfect in NGO or not-for-profit homeless emergency accommodation, where staff are actually trained and where there are proper standards in place, these types of instances do not arise. I really wish the Minister would actually act on this. I do not raise these as individual instances.

I raise them because they show the problem in the area.

On 2 August, a woman named Mairead was physically assaulted by a member of staff in a privately run hostel for homeless people. While the hostel is run by a private company, it is funded with public money. The incident, which I have seen on video, is harrowing and it clearly shows the male member of staff telling Mairead that she is a piece of junk, before telling her that he will crush her and hit her. The staff member then forcefully knocked Mairead to the ground. I cannot imagine what it would like to be physically attacked in the place where you are meant to be safe and in the place where you are sleeping; a place funded through public money to provide emergency accommodation. People who are homeless should get the support and shelter they need and be treated with humanity. Instead, we are seeing some appalling treatment, especially in homeless accommodation run by private companies. We have had increased instances of reports of assaults, threats and violence against people who have lost their home from individuals working for these private companies. In recent years, emergency homeless accommodation has been turned into a lucrative profit-making business for some individuals who have simply no regard for the welfare of vulnerable homeless people. I really want the Minister to start acting on this.

It appears that after this happened, no follow-up supports were offered to Mairead. She was forced to sleep on the streets before being placed in a night-time only accommodation in a hostel where it transpired that only herself and her partner were subject to the night-time only rules. Everyone else was able to access the accommodation during the day. The discriminatory treatment of Mairead resulted in her sleeping on the streets again for weeks more, before being provided with emergency only in the last couple of days. A woman who was physically assaulted on 2 August has had to spend most of the time since on the streets.

If there has been any investigation into this by the Dublin Region Homeless Executive, it certainly has not published it, and neither has it shown any evidence of learnings or action being taken since. The case has received media coverage in recent weeks and it has been raised in Dublin City Council with the Dublin Region Homeless Executive. This is what has happened to one person. I am not saying it is representative of what happens to all but I have reports of other instances of physical attacks by people working for private companies funded by the Government to provide homeless emergency accommodation.

I want to read for the Minister just a few testimonies from some people about their experiences of the housing crisis. The first is: I am a young professional working in a position for four years and 50% of my income goes on rent. I have no hope of building up savings. Another person says: "I can't afford to do anything but pay my rent. My partner and I both work and have no kids, yet we can't afford food sometimes." Another person says: "I commute two hours to and from college every day. I spend more time on the bus than in lectures." Another says: "I left the country in 2020. I have more disposable income and a much better quality of life." Another person says: "My husband and I are in our 30s and can't start a family yet because we are stuck sharing an apartment." Another person says: "It is very depressing knowing I'll probably never get my own house. I am 39 and have been on the housing list for six years. It feels hopeless." Another person says: "I am a college lecturer who's been living with my parents for almost three years now." The final person says: "I'm 32. My rent is so expensive that I have no hope of buying a house in Ireland. I am looking at emigrating. Not only is rent extortionate but there is also no security. Landlords are kicking people out every couple of years."

In the motion we have tabled today, we have a number of solutions that, if implemented, would help people in the housing disaster they are in now. I implore the Government to listen to them and to take them on board; to admit that ending the no-fault eviction ban was a mistake that it has led to record levels of homelessness. It is going up month after month. The Minister should admit that his strategies have not worked. We need action now to get homelessness down. We know that most people who become homeless had their last stable home in the private rented sector. Were we to reduce the flow of people into homelessness from the private rented rent sector, we would reduce the number of people becoming homeless and would reduce the number of people like Mairead who have had such an utterly unacceptable and traumatic experience at the hands of publicly funded emergency accommodation run by a private company.

Deputy Róisín Shortall

Increasingly, the public across all age cohorts has come to the conclusion that this Government is utterly failing to deliver affordable homes. I do not think the Minister could point to anything he has done during his term of office that has contributed to actually driving down the cost of housing. In fact, most of the initiatives he has taken are contributing to the high cost of housing. He has concentrated on subsidies, which do nothing to tackle the underlying reasons house prices are allowed to remain high and continue to grow.

First-time buyers now need a median income of more than €90,000 to purchase a home. In Dublin, it is more than €103,000. Let us look at the other side of that. The median disposable household income is just under €47,000, meaning home ownership is now completely out of reach for increasing numbers of workers. This Government's market-driven policies, along with its close ties with those interests who are making a packet out of housing, whether that is developers, land speculators or the property industry in general, have condemned an entire generation to unaffordable rents and unaffordable house prices. We are still dealing with the consequences of Fianna Fáil's last term in government, when it crashed the economy, and then after that Fine Gael rolled out the red carpet for vulture funds and real estate investment trusts, REITs. Unfortunately, this was followed by further poor policy decisions such as the housing assistance payment, HAP, and the scaling up of long-term leasing. In 2021 alone, a staggering €1.2 billion was spent on rent subsidies and leasing arrangements. For example, since 2014 HAP spending has gone from €0.4 million to €515 million last year, while €300 million has been spent on long-term leases since their introduction in 2008. Neither of these policies is a solution to the housing crisis. All they have done is turned social housing into an investment opportunity. Yet this Government's latest solution to the housing crisis is just more subsidies. The only people lining up in favour of them are the developers who lobbied for them, and in many ways wrote Government policy. Policies like Croí Cónaithe and the shared equity scheme prop up extortionate house prices; they do not reduce them. Public money would be much better spent increasing the delivery of affordable and genuinely cost-rental homes. An unambitious target of 5,500 affordable and cost-rental homes simply is not good enough. We need an acceleration of delivery. However, according to the Central Bank the 2023 target of 29,000 homes will be missed and it is also predicting that the targets for 2024 and 2025 are likely to be missed as well. This is extremely concerning, not least as the targets are already too low. This was again highlighted in the EU Commission's 2023 country report, which found that Ireland's housing targets needed to be substantially increased.

Another housing policy area in which the Government is found wanting is vacancy and dereliction. According to GeoDirectory, as of July, there were almost 82,000 vacant homes and more than 21,000 derelict properties. In my view, the Minister's vacant homes tax, at a rate of 0.3%, will not help to bring any of those homes back into use.

With this tax rate, the Minister is just pretending to do something of consequence but he is fooling no one. He could not honestly believe that a 0.3% tax rate would change anyone's behaviour. The most devastating consequence of this Government's inaction on housing is the homelessness crisis. There are 12,847 people living in homelessness, including 3,829 children and 181 pensioners, as my colleague said. That is probably the most shameful element of the Minister's tenure in government but he has failed across the board.

Minister for Housing, Local Government and Heritage (Deputy Darragh O'Brien)

I move amendment No. 1:

To delete all the words after "Dáil Éireann" and substitute the following:

"notes that Housing for All: A New Housing Plan is firmly focussed on re-establishing a sustainable housing delivery system capable of delivering for current and emerging needs and the Government:

— is actively working to improve Ireland's housing system and deliver more homes of all tenures for people with varying housing needs, including first-time buyers, renters, low-income households, and people experiencing homelessness;

— has a vision for the housing system over the longer term to achieve a steady supply of housing in the right locations with economic, social and environmental sustainability built into the system with four pathways to achieving housing for all:

— supporting home ownership and increasing affordability;

— eradicating homelessness, increasing social housing delivery and supporting social inclusion;

— increasing new housing supply; and

— addressing vacancy and efficient use of existing stock;

— is successfully increasing new housing supply, with a combination of public and private sector development, through State-led investment in expanded social and affordable housing programmes; and

— is removing barriers that impede the private sector capacity to deliver at scale, critical to the successful implementation of Housing for All: A New Housing Plan, and which will yield housing affordability and reverse the historic decline in home ownership;

welcomes:

— that housing supply is increasing, and will continue to be increased incrementally and sustainably;

— that Housing for All: A New Housing Plan is succeeding in its objective of increasing overall housing supply in a robust and sustainable manner; and in 2022, almost 30,000 homes were built, an increase of 45.2 per cent from 2021, and 5,250 homes or 21 per cent higher than the Housing for All: A New Housing Plan target of 24,600; and the first half of 2023 has seen 14,017 home completions, the highest for this period since the Central Statistics Office (CSO) data series began in 2011;

— the fact that new home commencements continue to out-perform expectations following the strong uptick in commencements recorded in the fourth quarter of 2022; 18,500 new homes were commenced between January and July this year, up 12 per cent on the same period last year; and this strong commencement activity, and a recent upward trend in planning permissions, indicates that the uplift in 2022 house building activity is likely to be maintained in 2023, when delivery of 29,000 homes is anticipated, and sustained into 2024 and 2025;

— the fact that 10,263 social homes were delivered in 2022 (an 11.9 per cent increase on 2021 figures, when 9,169 social homes were provided); and this represents the highest annual output of social homes in decades and the highest level of delivery of new-build social housing since 1975;

— the fact that 40,000 more families are in social housing than ten years ago and the proportion of people in social housing has increased in the past ten years;

— the record growth in mortgage drawdowns by first-time buyers, with drawdowns at their highest level since 2007 running at 400-500 per week;

— the fact that the proportion of adults living with their parents has remained stable at 13 per cent since 2011;

— the fact that more households own their own home than ever before, at over 1.2 million;

— the fact that a record €4.5 billion in State housing investment in 2023 will ensure the substantial uplift in supply in 2022 can be maintained and exceeded, with 9,100 direct build social homes and 5,500 affordable homes to be delivered; and

— the fact that new measures announced by the Government in April 2023 will further boost the improved levels of housing activity, such as:

— reducing the cost of construction by scrapping the development levies required to connect new homes with roads, water and other services, and subsidising development levies, saving up to the value of €12,650 per home on average – this will reduce the cost of building a home and will apply for a limited time only to act as an incentive;

— increasing the pace at which vacant and derelict properties are renovated for new housing by enhancing grants available to cut the cost of restoring empty homes and making it easier to apply – from May 2023 the Vacant Property Refurbishment Grant has been:

— increased from €30,000 to €50,000 for vacant properties;

— increased from €50,000 to €70,000 for derelict properties;

— extended to cover houses built up to 2007; and

— made available for properties intended for rental as well as owner-occupation; and

— the Government is supporting the construction of affordable apartments for Cost Rental and facilitating the commencement of thousands of affordable apartments to rent, which have planning permission but which are not being progressed – with a substantial subsidy for a limited time only to speed up construction; and the Secure Tenancy Affordable Rental investment (STAR) scheme, along with a revision of the terms of the Cost Rental Equity Loan, which increased the level of overall State funding on a sliding scale basis to up to 55 per cent of capital costs, were launched in July and are now receiving applications; and STAR is targeted at all private market operators, including the Land Development Agency, and is underpinned by a Government commitment of up to €750 million to deliver 4,000 Cost Rental units at more affordable rent; and

supports the Government housing policy which is succeeding in restoring the first-time buyer to playing a key role in the new and existing house sales market, and is actively assisting and supporting individuals and families on modest incomes to purchase their own home at an affordable price as evidenced by:

— the launch of the Help to Buy (HTB) Scheme in 2017 which has, to date, assisted over 41,000 first-time buyer households to secure a new home and has been extended to 2024;

— the CSO Residential Property Price Index underlining the substantial growth in first-time buyer activity - some 17,220 homes, including circa 5,280 new homes, were purchased by first-time buyers in the year to July 2023 – an 8 per cent increase on the previous year and one-third of all homes purchased by households in the period;

— recent Banking and Payment Federation of Ireland figures illustrating record growth in mortgage drawdowns by first-time buyers, with drawdowns currently at their highest level since 2007;

— the 'Owner Occupier Guarantee', under which local authorities can now designate a specified number of units in a development for first-time buyers and owner occupiers; and in May 2021 changes were also made to the rate of stamp duty payable on bulk purchases and new planning guidelines were issued to prevent inappropriate investment in homes and duplexes and to ensure household purchasers, and social or affordable housing are not displaced by inappropriate commercial activity – some 31,000 homes received planning permission with conditions prohibiting bulk purchase by, or multiple sale to, a single purchaser in the two years from May 2021 to May 2023;

— the First Home Scheme, launched on 7th July, 2022, which supports first-time buyers in purchasing new houses and apartments in the private market through the use of an equity share model; and according to the most recent scheme data available, some 6,000 applicants have registered and over 2,362 applicants have been approved under the scheme and received eligibility certificates; and interest in First Homes is strong, with new applications for approval showing a strong momentum and the scheme will continue to be central to the overall affordable housing response nationwide;

— delivery of the first Local Authority Affordable Purchase homes in a generation in 2022, which saw 323 homes delivered for approved affordable housing applicants on a shared equity basis, and the growing pipeline of homes with Affordable Housing Fund approval for delivery as affordable purchase homes, which currently stands at over 2,700 homes across 19 local authorities, and continues to be expanded and developed; and

— the Croí Cónaithe (Cities) Scheme which will support the building of up to 5,000 apartments for sale to owner-occupiers;

further notes that affordable housing supply at scale will continue to be developed and expanded through the mix of new and extended initiatives now in place and operating effectively, including the First Home scheme, local authority-provided affordable purchase schemes, the HTB initiative and the expanded Local Authority Home Loan; and taken together, the suite of affordable measures will make homeownership achievable for tens of thousands of individuals and families during the lifetime of Housing for All: A New Housing Plan;

acknowledges the close monitoring of the Residential Tenancies Acts 2004-2022, and the operation of the rental market by the Department of Housing, Local Government and Heritage, the Residential Tenancies Board and the Housing Agency and further acknowledges that:

— a comprehensive review of the private rental sector is currently taking account of the significant regulatory changes in the residential rental market over the past several years; and the review is essential to planning future policy for the residential rented sector and will report on how our housing system can be enhanced to provide an efficient, affordable, viable, safe and secure framework for both tenants and landlords;

— current private rental market challenges cannot be resolved without the combined benefits of public and private investment;

— some €13.5 billion of development finance is required each year to achieve the current average Housing for All: A New Housing Plan target output of 33,000 homes annually, with the vast majority of this required from private sources and – alongside public investment – is the only way to deliver the housing needed at substantial scale;

— institutional investment is a critical piece of this overall investment – it is a normal facet of housing systems across Europe and beyond and without it activity in the housing market would be much reduced and the pressure already facing renters and prospective home-owners would increase significantly;

— an important role has been played by this investment, particularly in the development of new high-density urban housing in recent years, and the importance of maintaining this investment;

— the Government has strengthened regulatory controls on short-term lets and approval has been given for the priority drafting of the Registration of Short-Term Tourist Letting Bill and publication of the General Scheme of the Bill; and the legislation will deliver on the Housing for All: A New Housing Plan objective to make more efficient use of existing housing stock with the establishment of the Fáilte Ireland registration system;

— rental affordability continues to be a priority concern for the Government; and Cost Rental accommodation was introduced by this Government as a new form of housing tenure in Ireland offering long-term security of tenure at cost-based rents that are at least 25 per cent below the private market rate for comparable properties;

— to date, 770 Cost Rental homes have been delivered by Approved Housing Bodies, Local Authorities and the Land Development Agency; and over 1,400 local authority Cost Rental units (across 12 projects) have been approved to date for assistance totaling €150 million from the Affordable Housing Fund, including 50 units already delivered at Enniskerry Road; and the pipeline of Cost Rental homes will continue to be developed and expanded on an ongoing basis; and

— there has also been an extension of the Rent Pressure Zone (RPZ) system to 2024 and a 2 per cent rent cap; and

accepts that Housing for All: A New Housing Plan is an iterative and responsive action-based plan that is not limited to or confined by implementation of its original suite of 213 measures which are subject to regular monitoring and review, with updated and new measures being added as and when required and welcomes:

— the second annual review of Housing for All: A New Housing Plan actions currently underway and this process will conclude and the next Housing for All Action Plan Update will be published following the Budget in October; and

— the proposed refreshing of housing targets, including for social and affordable housing, having regard to the Census 2022 data and updated population and structural housing demand projections on foot of analysis being undertaken by the Economic and Social Research Institute (ESRI) for the National Planning Framework revision; and this work by the ESRI will be finalised in Spring 2024, paving the way for housing demand and needs to be reassessed and new targets to be revised later next year.".

I thank Deputy Cian O'Callaghan for tabling this Social Democrats motion that affords us an opportunity to discuss a number of the issues, particularly around alternatives and what other parties have put forward. I reiterate, as I said this morning in relation to the case with Mairéad, that it is disgraceful. It should never happen. I assume Deputy O'Callaghan has passed on the information. I ask Deputy Shortall to do likewise. I know she raised a general point but it is extremely distressing, in particular, what that woman experienced. It is wrong and needs to be utterly condemned but it needs to be investigated by An Garda Síochána. I assume the Deputy has passed those details on to the authorities.

Fundamentally, this is about increasing supply, which is what Housing for All is about. It is about increasing supply across the board of both social and affordable and private homes. It is about catching up on ten or 12 years of significant undersupply. That is just a fact. Deputy Shortall spoke about targets - last year, the target was 24,600, which we exceeded. Nearly 30,000 homes were built last year, more than were built in the period of the Government in which Deputy Shortall served a short term as a Minister of State, during which fewer than 30,000 homes were built in five years. The focus has got to be on delivering good public homes on sites like that on Oscar Traynor Road, which Deputy Shortall is familiar with. The sod will be turned on that shortly and it will be one of the largest housing projects in Dublin. Another example is the Ballymastone site in Donabate, with 1,200 new homes, or Shanganagh Castle, which Deputy Boyd Barrett will know about. One can see the commencements happening. Commencement and completion figures this year are up substantially, even in a difficult year, particularly with regard to the funding environment. The State is also investing 11 times what was invested only eight years ago on behalf of its people in social and affordable housing and schemes that support home ownership too. It is approximately €4.5 billion this year. Much of that is also being done through the Land Development Agency, which I remind Deputy Shortall and her colleagues in the Social Democrats that they opposed. They voted against the legislation for the Land Development Agency. I brought forward the legislation and capitalised it. It delivered its first homes last year and will deliver more this year. It actively has a site in Shanganagh and St. Kevin's in Cork through project Tosaigh, which will deliver another 5,000 homes. The Social Democrats saw fit to oppose that, which is fine. They must stand over their record. The Deputy spoke about home ownership and supporting people to buy their own homes. The Social Democrats again voted against the Affordable Housing Act 2021.

Deputy Catherine Murphy

Unaffordable housing, was it?

Deputy Darragh O'Brien

The Affordable Housing Act 2021 established cost rental on a national footing and underpins the affordable housing fund that allows us to deliver affordable housing to local authorities and to make that subvention on behalf of the State to make the homes affordable. The Social Democrats voted against that legislation as well. It opposed the first home scheme, which so far has helped, in just over a year, 2,500 households to buy their own homes at an affordable rate. The Social Democrats opposed-----

Deputy Róisín Shortall

More subsidies.

Deputy Darragh O'Brien

I did not interrupt Deputy Shortall once. The Social Democrats also opposed that. Another real assistance that helps first-time buyers is the help to buy grant, which is a rebate of a tax people paid to them to help-----

Deputy Róisín Shortall

Another subsidy.

Deputy Darragh O'Brien

-----with their deposit. Some 41,000 households have been helped with that so far. Again, the Social Democrats opposed it. Every single measure brought forward-----

Deputy Róisín Shortall

They are all subsidies.

Deputy Darragh O'Brien

Every single measure has been opposed by the Social Democrats. I have a lot of regard for Deputy O'Callaghan. If the motion he tabled is the first effort at Social Democrat housing policy and this is apparently the alternative to the most comprehensive housing plan brought forward by any government - it is the single biggest intervention by any government in the history of the State - it is a very poor alternative. Last year, we were able to deliver nearly 10,500 new social homes, more new-build social homes than have been done in 50 years. Deputy Shortall quoted Central Bank projections for the end of the year. We are confident we will exceed our target this year, which may disappoint the Deputy. We will build more social homes this year - 2023 - than we built last year and we will deliver more affordable homes this year than last year. We will exceed the target we set ourselves this year. The Central Bank also projected last year that we would not hit the target, which we exceeded by more than 5,000. We will wait and see until early in the first quarter of next year. If Deputy Shortall looks at the commencement and completion figures up to the end of quarter 2 this year, even the August commencements, which I gave out earlier in the House, they are 31% up on the same month last year, she may again be disappointed but all the projections are going in the right direction.

The one area in which they are not is homelessness. I am acutely aware of my responsibility in this area for those who do not have a home to call their own. That has been increasing. At the Joint Committee on Housing, Local Government and Heritage, I, along with Deputies O'Callaghan and Ó Broin and other members of the committee, discussed the progress of the purchase of homes with tenant in situ. It has been very successful; the cost-rental tenant in situ scheme is moving forward. We will spend about €300 million this year on purchasing homes and securing private tenancies as public tenancies and social homes, bringing them into social housing stock. Those are in addition to the other measures I mentioned around affordable housing, like the 42 schemes we approved across the country in 18 local authorities, including Oscar Traynor Road. Deputy Shortall's record on Oscar Traynor is there for everyone to see, as to why that scheme has been delayed for years and years. We are getting on and delivering cost rental and affordable homes for people, like in Ballymastone in north County Dublin, with 1,200 homes. I use that as an example because the Social Democrats also opposed that development on the ground.

We will do everything we humanly can to increase supply across all tenures and see a reversal in that trend in increasing numbers of homelessness.

Deputy Róisín Shortall

What about cost?

Deputy Darragh O'Brien

We will do that by increasing supply and exiting more people from emergency accommodation into permanent, secure housing. In the last quarter of last year and the first two quarters of this year, we have seen more people exiting from homelessness into permanent social housing than we have seen since those records were collected. It is a good trend. We have also seen that there are many reasons people fall into homelessness and quite a diverse demographic as to why it happens. We have to support all of them. All people who require the assistance of the State require good emergency accommodation. We are funding that this year and doing everything we can to exit people out. What does not help when trying to increase supply is people on the ground giving any reason they feel it is appropriate to object to good housing developments, including social and affordable housing. People will have to live with the decisions they have made. It may have been for political capital on the ground that they saw fit to side with certain residents' groups to find a reason to oppose good developments in constituencies. I do not believe that is acceptable. We all agree there is a housing crisis and that we need to provide homes for our people. When it comes to specific decisions that need to be made or when very senior Deputies in this House on a regular basis on social media welcome decisions and refusals of developments in their constituencies, people will see very clearly what the real bona fides of those Deputies are. Do they actually want to see progress, or do they want a situation in which they can continue to argue that no progress is being made so they can capitalise on that for short-term political gain? That is not what I am about.

I and this Government are about increasing housing supply with more good social homes for people and cost rental, which did not exist 20 months ago in this State. We legislated for it and more than 1,000 tenancies have been approved. We will do more this year. The Social Democrats opposed the legislation that brought forward cost rental. The Social Democrats voted against the Affordable Housing Act 2021.

Deputy Róisín Shortall

What the Government is doing is not real cost rental, like Oscar Traynor Road and big subsidies.

An Cathaoirleach Gníomhach (Deputy Bernard J. Durkan)

One speaker, please. Everybody has their turn.

Deputy Darragh O'Brien

The people whom I have visited in the constituency and estate right beside Oscar Traynor Road want homes for their sons and daughters. Deputies in that area who have made a virtue of finding any reason to oppose that development have to answer for themselves. I want to see progress and delivery. I want to see sites such as that on Oscar Traynor Road being developed for residents and young people in the area, among others, and that is what is happening. It is happening in Donabate, at Shanganagh Castle and across the country. It may not suit the Deputy's political narrative but that is for her to deal with.

Deputy Róisín Shortall

Buying houses at market value is not cost rental.

Deputy Darragh O'Brien

Every measure that has been brought forward to help in home ownership-----

Deputy Róisín Shortall

Stop pretending.

Deputy Darragh O'Brien

That is happening. Some 400 first-time buyers a month are drawing down mortgages, 41,000 are people getting the help-to-buy grant and 2,500 households, with that number growing every day, are able to buy their home through the first home scheme. The Deputy opposes every single one of those measures.

An Cathaoirleach Gníomhach (Deputy Bernard J. Durkan)

The next slot is the Social Democrats. I am sure the Minister will not interrupt.

Deputy Darragh O'Brien

Certainly not.

Deputy Jennifer Whitmore

I look forward to it. I thank Deputy O'Callaghan for tabling the motion. It is an incredibly important issue and has been such for many years. It is the primary issue for many people in communities. There are 12,847 people homeless and I suspect it is the only thing they have on their minds at the moment. I was looking forward to the opportunity to have a grown-up conversation about different policies and proposals but, unfortunately, the Minister used his time to make disingenuous political points. That undermines this Chamber. Rather than discussing the pros and cons of the motion, he used his time to score points. On an issue such as this, that is unacceptable and, as a Minister, he should be above all that.

The Social Democrats have a very different view on the housing crisis from that of the Government. We do not believe the purpose of the Government is to use taxpayers' money to assist struggling homeowners to pay the extraordinary prices that developers have put on houses and, in essence, to use taxpayers' money to subsidise and put money into the pockets of developers. That is exactly what the Government's policies do. We want to bring down the price of housing so that people can afford it without relying on State supports and taxpayers' money as a subsidy for those prices. Fianna Fáil's compass is, and has been for many decades, pointed towards developers and ensuring developers' profits. That brought the country to the brink of collapse. That is not the Social Democrats' point of view or focus and it is not something we would do either in opposition or on the Government benches.

The motion makes reasonable, practical and achievable asks and it is a pity the Minister did not discuss them. It cuts to the heart of the reality of far too many people living in inadequate housing and homelessness. I see it every week of the year in my constituency of Wicklow. People come to me who have to return to their parents' homes because they cannot afford to rent or live in their home county. They end up in their childhood bedroom, in the box room, sometimes with their partners or children, in order to save for a deposit or to save on rent. A recent report published by the Central Statistics Office found that 15% of people are back living with their parents. The report illustrates how the number has sky-rocketed throughout Ireland. Wicklow has among the highest rates of adult children returning to the family home. There is an entire generation of young Wicklow residents locked out of home ownership and unable to afford rent.

In April 2022, 17,090 adults in Wicklow, or 15% of those aged 18 or over in the county, lived with their parents. It is the second highest rate, by county, in Ireland. Bray has the highest rates in the county, with one in five adults living in his or her parents' home. I meet two types of people on the doorsteps. The first is those who own their homes. People who own their home are usually secure and do not worry about issues of homelessness or housing because they have their security sorted. Homeowners throughout Wicklow, however, are worried about where their children and grandchildren will live. I suspect the situation is similar throughout the country. That is now their concern. Even though they own their home, they know it is nearly impossible for their children to get onto that ladder. A recent report from the Economic and Social Research Institute, ESRI, found that when it comes to home ownership, Ireland has among the widest gaps in western Europe between younger and older people.

The Minister threw a lot of statistics at us. He needs to look at the statistics that matter, such as the 12,847 people who are homeless or the number of adults who have to live with their parents because they cannot afford to rent or buy a home. Those are the statistics the Minister needs to consider. He needs to engage with this discussion and policy issue with a genuine concern and make an effort to make a difference.

Deputy Catherine Murphy

We can come up with all sorts of reasons why house prices are so high in this country but I do not see any real attempt to drive them down. This is an island off the west coast of Europe and there is a need to bring in materials and all the rest so, in terms of a comparison, I will look at average house prices on the island. In Dublin, the average house price is €436,000. Nationally, it is €330,000. Why is it €260,000 in Belfast, €202,000 in Derry and €200,000 in Northern Ireland as a whole? It is very difficult to figure out why it is so much more expensive in one part of the island compared with another part of it. Those are up-to-date figures.

The Minister referred to affordability. One cannot say it is affordable if it is more than 35% of the gross income of a household because that is the determinant factor in terms of what is sustainable. People want to buy, mainly because it gives them security of tenure, but there is certainly nothing like the ambition that is needed in respect of affordable rental.

I am the Social Democrats spokesperson on justice. We have been reading reports on adverse childhood experiences and the associated impact on education and health outcomes, but also on things like anti-social behaviour, for example. Very often, such behaviour is underpinned by trauma. Homelessness is one such adverse childhood experience. Anyone who thinks that if a child is homeless for six months or a year, that will be the cost is not reading the academic documents on what is going to happen. The Taoiseach made the point on numerous occasions that it is not the same families who are homeless all the time but, rather, it keeps rotating. In fact, that makes it worse because there are even more children who will have that experience. We need to make children the number one priority in the context of homelessness. I never thought we would be in this House talking about homeless children. We always understood there was an issue, very often to do with addiction and a whole lot of things like that, and that was the reason people ended up in homelessness. People are now becoming homeless because they cannot pay the rent. They do not have security of tenure and there is no eviction ban even when people pay their rent. Ireland is abnormal in that regard.

A very big price will be paid by those children and by this society by virtue of the fact we are not dealing with this. It has a longer-term consequence.

On the Land Development Agency, we actually proposed a land development agency back in 2016. The remit of that agency was not the one we see now. It would have been about project management, master planning, economies of scale to drive down prices, and de-risk for smaller builders as they are the ones who very often cannot raise the funds to build. We put that proposal forward because even at that point in 2016 we were considering the cost of housing. When we consider how much house prices have gone up since then, if we had had that policy implemented at that stage I wonder what difference it would have made. I am convinced it would have made a substantial difference because we would have had those economies of scale.

A person contacted me today. He is part of a couple where both are working. They have two children. He is tearing his hair out because the family is facing eviction as the landlord wants to sell. I looked on the digital media platforms to see what is available: a three-bedroom house is €2,200; a three-bedroom house in another area is €2,500; and a two-bedroom apartment is €1,700. This family does not qualify to go on the housing list but they are just a bit above the cut-off point. They really have no hope. There is very little the Minister can give to those people in solutions.

An Cathaoirleach Gníomhach (Deputy Bernard J. Durkan)

Sinn Féin is next with Deputies Ó Broin, Gould, O'Rourke, Cronin and Ó Murchú. There are a couple of spare minutes in that slot.

Deputy Eoin Ó Broin

I am sure we will use them up; do not worry. I thank Deputy Cian O'Callaghan and his colleagues in the Social Democrats, not only for tabling this Private Members' motion, which we are more than happy to support, but also for giving us the opportunity to have this important debate.

Moments ago, the Minister told us that he and his colleagues would move heaven and earth to tackle this crisis. Well, there actually two things that he will not do. He will not keep the promises about affordable housing that he made in the general election campaign and he will not meet any of his own targets for the delivery of affordable housing during his tenure as Minister. Let us cast our minds back to the general election of 2020. The Fianna Fáil promise on affordable housing during that campaign was for 10,000 genuinely affordable homes to be delivered using the Ó Cualann model every year for five years. This was to be 50,000 homes at prices below €250,000 each. Only a matter of weeks in government and that promise was quietly shelved and quietly forgotten about. Darragh O'Brien also inherited the former Minister, Eoghan Murphy's, much trumpeted serviced sites fund. There was a promise in budget 2019 to deliver 6,000 affordable homes with €300 million over that period. In fact, so great was this idea that the Minister as the Opposition spokesperson under the confidence and supply arrangement claimed that it was his idea and that he negotiated it. When Eoghan Murphy was the Minister for two of those three years ,how many of those homes were delivered? It was zero. In the first year that Deputy O'Brien was Minister, not a single affordable home was delivered under that scheme. Three years into the scheme, more money is unspent. In budget 2021, the Minister promised the cost-rental equity loan. He said there was enough funding for 750 cost-rental units that year. How many were provided in the first of his own schemes in the first full year in government? It was only 75. While 750 was never enough in the first place, to only deliver a paltry 75 units speaks volumes. Then, after much delay the Minister finally got around to publishing his housing plan. Of course, he never had any policy when he was in opposition. He did not even have it in his first year or more in government. When he eventually published a housing plan, he promised 4,000-plus affordable homes in 2022 and 5,000 affordable homes this year. How many of those homes have been delivered? He has trotted out an awful lot of figures but he did not actually talk about the one issue that he directly controls and that is crucially important, which his own direct delivery of affordable homes. Last year, of the 4,000 promised affordable homes, just over 1,000 were delivered comprising 323 affordable purchase homes and 684 cost-rental. This was only one quarter of what the Minister had promised.

This year, apparently, the Government's housing plan is working wonderfully and they are moving heaven and earth and doing everything in their power. How many of the 5,000 affordable homes have been delivered this year? The problem is that we do not know because the Minister will not tell us. He is meant to produce a report detailing social and affordable housing delivery at the end of each quarter. He has held a press conference at the end of each quarter. He has published very glossy documents. What is the figure that is missing from those documents? It is the one figure the Minister is responsible for, which is the direct delivery of affordable homes.

The Minister knows that his Department got the verified figures for social affordable housing after quarter 1 and he chose not to publish them because they were so low. When he got the verified figures for quarter 2, the big question is why he has he not published them. He is looking at his phone. Maybe he is looking on his phone at the minute to see if he has an email from his officials to say he can release the figures and that they are in the Department waiting to be published. We want to know why there is a delay. I do not know but perhaps the cynic in me thinks the Minister is not publishing the figures because they are so way off target. If I am wrong, he can feel free to heckle me, give me the correct figures and put the information on the record.

We then have this deeply dishonest claim that €4 billion in public money is being spent every year on social and affordable housing. It is not and the Minister knows this. We are aware this was the promise in 2022 and 2023 but he underspent and the LDA underspent, and because of his departmental and governmental failures, the approved housing bodies have not been able to spend the money. The Minister should really come clean and tell us how much is actually being spent not what he is promising.

Of course, when confronted with all of this failure - and it is a catalogue of failure - the Minister responds in typical fashion. He extols the virtues of the so-called help-to-buy scheme, which pushes up house prices and 40% of the money went to people who did not need it. I am not criticising them; I am criticising the design of the scheme. More than €200 million in public money went to assist people to buy homes when they already had a full deposit and a mortgage. That money could have significantly reduced the number of people in emergency accommodation currently. The Minister also extols the virtues of the shared equity loan. Apart from the fact that it pushes up house prices and saddles working people with ever greater levels of debt, we were told that 1,800 mortgages would be assisted last year. There were none. The target for this year is 1,800 to 2,000. The scheme is going to miss its targets. It is a badly designed scheme that does not even work. The reality is that even when we consider the Croí Cónaithe towns scheme, it is badly designed, it is delayed and it will have virtually no impact on tackling vacancy and dereliction. The Minister is smiling but our proposal to bring 4,000 vacant and derelict units back into use, including allowing people to have access to a grant, is far better than his paltry, unsuccessful and badly designed scheme.

Where are we at after three years of Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael in government and Deputy O'Brien as the Minister? House prices have never been higher because of his failure to deliver social and affordable homes and because of the Government's inflationary policies. This is why it is time for change. This is why I enthusiastically support the motion. We will outline again in great detail in our alternative housing budget how 20,000 public homes a year can be delivered, including 8,000 affordable homes in the first year but absolutely moving to 10,000-plus in years two, three and four. Until the Government accepts that this is the scale of ambition required, and until it invests the funds, cuts back the red tape and empowers our local authorities and AHBs to deliver the homes that it promised in the general election campaign in 2020, this crisis is going to get worse. This is why I support the motion. I support time for change. The sooner Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael are out of power, the better for all those in acute housing need.

Deputy Thomas Gould

The Minister is a great man for the facts. The real facts and the truth on the ground is that last year he and the Government delivered 323 affordable houses and 135 of them were in Cork. I can be critical of Cork City Council sometimes, but on affordable housing, it has led the way.

The Minister gave it a target of 278, to be completed by 2026. It will probably have it met next year or, at the latest, the year after. Two hundred and seventy-eight by 2026 is a paltry target and the Minister is saying the Government has a plan to sort the housing crisis, including the affordable housing crisis. Its plan is too small and will not solve the crisis.

Some local authorities want to build affordable houses and give people a chance but they are not being supported by this Government, including the Minister. In this regard, I will give the Minister one more fact. In Glanmire, 1,200 people applied for a cost-rental scheme involving 32 units. That is the scale at which we need to be delivering but the Government is not doing so.

Let me give some of the facts, one of which concerns a lady I met last week who told me she has a son and daughter in England. The son has bought an apartment. Another son, who was working in Canada for a couple of years, came home when his visa ran out. He got the visa back on a Wednesday and was in Canada the following Sunday because he does not see a future here. He wants to remain in Canada full time. It is this Government that is driving people there.

I was talking to a couple whose two grown-up kids came back home. The daughter did so because she is saving for a mortgage and the son because he could not afford the sky-high rents that the Government has overseen. The couple had raised their kids and worked hard and now was their time, but they could not have that time because their children had to come home owing to the Government's failed housing policy.

I will leave the Minister with the case of a couple I know who were staunch Fianna Fáil supporters. The woman told me she will never vote for Fianna Fáil again because it drove her four children to the four corners of the world. Two are in Australia, one is in England, and one is in America. She said to me that voting for the party was nearly the worst thing she ever did. She and her husband worked hard, educated their kids and did everything right, and then Fianna Fáil drove those kids to the four corners of the world. That is the reality of the Minister's housing policy. He is coming in here to tell us about all he is doing as Minister responsible for housing when the facts are that homelessness has never been worse, rents have never been as high and the cost of purchasing a house has never been as high. Apart from politics, does the Minister not look at things sometimes and say we are not getting them right? Is there a time when he is ever honest with the Department, Opposition and people, because it is all about the people? The Government is not delivering and the people are suffering.

I support Deputy Cian O'Callaghan and the motion of his party, the Social Democrats, because if we do not get affordable, cost-rental and social housing right, the crisis will only get much worse.

Deputy Darren O'Rourke

I thank Deputy Cian O'Callaghan and his party, the Social Democrats, for tabling this motion. The cost of buying a home has increased by more than 25% since this Government came into office. It now costs almost €330,000, on average, to buy a home, an increase of more than €66,000 since 2020 and €90,000 since 2017. In my constituency, the average cost of a home is well in excess of €330,000. I look at www.daft.ie, particularly to see the prices of new homes in Ashbourne, Dunshaughlin, Dunboyne and Ratoath and note that one would be lucky to get a new home for €450,000. There are properties for well in excess of that. Further down into the constituency, in my home town, Kells, where I was born and reared, new homes are for sale for €400,000. That is huge money for workers and families.

The median income required by first-time buyers of new homes is now more than €90,000, and more than €103,000 in Dublin. Who has that? If they have it and can stretch themselves to buying a property, what pressure are they being put under to sustain a mortgage? We are aware that there is a surge in the number who are unable to make repayments. Early arrears cases increased by 3,000 in quarter 2 compared with the same period in 2021. One personal insolvency practitioner reported an increase of 475% in the number of people contacting him due to their not being able to make their repayments.

There is a small number of so-called affordable properties in Meath. There is a scheme in Navan at the minute and one recently closed in Dunshaughlin, but the properties are not affordable, certainly by the Minister's own measure when he was in opposition. The cheapest three-bedroom properties in the affordable housing scheme are coming in at €320,000 and the cheapest two-bedroom properties are coming in at €292,000. This is simply unaffordable and, as said by previous speakers, it has a real impact on families' and individuals' ability to plan their lives and on their health and well-being, sense of themselves, and job and mobility prospects. It is an absolute crisis, and this Government has proven very clearly that it is incapable of dealing with it.

Deputy Réada Cronin

Gabhaim buíochas freisin leis na Social Democrats as an Private Members' motion seo.

Housing and affordability are not mutually exclusive. It is not a sign of an advanced society or economy if people cannot afford a home. It is not a sign of success or progress if hard work and a good job are no longer enough for a person to be able to afford to rent or buy a home of their own. Rather, it is a social failure. It is an epic social failure and it is exactly what this Government has engineered and inflicted on our society. This Government has done it without mercy and is completely indifferent to the suffering, fear and humiliation of people facing eviction. It is indifferent to men and women whose nerves are shot because their adult children and grandchildren are on top of them as they cannot afford to rent elsewhere. These are working, ambitious people and Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael have engineered things such that there is nowhere for them to go.

The Minister was laughing earlier but my secretary was crying in her office today in north Kildare because of the cases of two men in their late 60s who, although they have been working since they were teenagers, are both now living in their cars. Both have serious health problems, including serious vascular issues. Both are at the end of their tether but the housing Minister of the Government is laughing and thinks this is a laughing matter. I am talking about two separate cases. These men do not know each other.

I am also dealing with the case of a woman with a child with a chronic illness. That woman was advised by a housing body to give in her notice on her HAP rental because her home was to be ready last July. She is now homeless because the apartment she was due to go into, in Naas, has been subject to a legal issue. Since the mother has been nominated for accommodation, she cannot avail of homelessness services. This is where the red tape comes in. Kildare County Council wanted to give up her nomination so she can access homeless accommodation.

Deputy Cian O'Callaghan was talking about the rigmarole and outsourcing of the Government. Why are we even dealing with housing bodies? We should be dealing with the council. Kildare County Council has actually run out of homeless accommodation in Kildare. Its staff cannot pick up the phones because the Minister is not talking to the workers and getting this industrial thing sorted out. It is just one thing after another with the Government. Its housing policy is dismantling people, families and what it means to be a citizen in a democratic republic. It is dismantling the lives of people of every generation. From babies to those in old age, from cradle to grave, nobody is safe from Fianna Fáil, Fine Gael and the Greens in this housing crisis. People who depend solely on their salaries from month to month cannot afford the high rents in north Kildare. I have cases of men and women in their 60s who are trying to rent, and the State pension will go nowhere near towards meeting their accommodation needs. People need care and, by God, they need change.

Deputy Ruairí Ó Murchú

In fairness, I thank the Social Democrats, including Deputy Cian O'Callaghan. It is hardly shocking that we have a motion that relates to affordable housing, but it is more like a lack of affordable housing. We have unaffordable rents and house prices and the situation is getting worse. We can all bandy about all the percentages we want – good, bad or indifferent – but the fact is that we know what people are looking at when they are looking at www.daft.ie, even in respect of the town of Dundalk. We all bore ourselves with this sometimes but unfortunately the people who have to deal with it daily do not.

In Dundalk and its surrounds there are approximately ten houses for somewhere between €1,200 for a standard house up to €2,750 per month. Again, we have all seen higher rents than that. It just so happens that is all that is available. When we talk about unaffordable housing, we are also talking about unavailable housing. We all know the issues that exist for those who have been lucky enough to buy a house. We know they have unaffordable mortgages. We need to see the Government step up because it is all well and good giving out about our proposal, which was time-constrained and targeted, but people require help and we need to see a Government that is willing to give it.

We know that the issue of housing and the lack of it will not be resolved until we see accelerated delivery. We have been talking about modular housing, timber frame housing and 3-D concrete printing, but the fact is that is all we have been talking about. We need to see scaling-up on a major level. We need to see targets. We can all talk about the lack of affordable and cost-rental units being supplied by each local authority. It is straightforward for me to talk about it because the number is zero for Louth County Council. This will not wash.

The Minister was in the House. He is able to bluster and he is good at it. On some level, if we were not dealing with such a serious issue, I would nearly commend him. On some level he does not care and he will say whatever is necessary, but as Deputy Ó Broin asked, where are the targets and figures and when will we see delivery?

I agree with what Deputy Cronin said. We need to see Government intervention in the action Fórsa is taking at this time. There are people working in homeless services. I would not like to be doing their job. As difficult as the job we do is, in some cases we put the worst circumstances in front of them. Those people are in an absolutely dreadful situation. The Government cannot be a spectator. We need housing to be delivered. We have all seen homeless figures going through the roof, which we all expected. Even where there are supports, they are not the supports that are necessary. There are regular people who never saw themselves in that circumstance but have fallen into it and there are others who need additional resources and those are not being supplied in any way, shape or form.

Deputy Gould put it well when he stated we are almost back in the period of austerity. People are making the decision to leave for Canada, Australia and everywhere. That is people with good jobs. It is not sustainable. It is not good enough. We have had housing advocacy organisations talking about what is wrong, but now the IDA and IBEC are talking about it. It is a pure disaster. We will bring the system down. We need to see action and we need to see it now.

Debate adjourned.