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Dáil Éireann debate -
Tuesday, 30 Jan 2018

Vol. 964 No. 4

Affordable Housing: Motion [Private Members]

I move:

That Dáil Éireann notes that:

— since taking office in 2011, Fine Gael have not delivered a single affordable rental or purchase home through any Government scheme;

— the Rebuilding Ireland Action Plan for Housing and Homelessness contains no targets and no clear funding stream for the delivery of affordable housing;

— the Fine Gael-Fianna Fáil Confidence and Supply Arrangement for a Fine Gael-led Minority Government has no targets or proposals for the delivery of affordable housing;

— Fianna Fáil have facilitated two Fine Gael budgets despite neither containing any credible proposals for delivering affordable housing;

— Fianna Fáil's Budget 2018 proposals contain no targets or proposals for the delivery of affordable housing;

— the €90 million Help to Buy Scheme is driving up house prices;

— the €200 million Local Infrastructure Housing Activation Fund is unlikely to deliver a significant number of genuinely affordable housing and may deliver no affordable homes in Dublin;

— the €25 million affordable housing fund announced in Budget 2018 will only deliver 650 affordable homes;

— the revised local authority first time buyers mortgage will be of limited value if genuinely affordable homes are not available to purchase;

— the introduction of Rent Pressure Zones has not constrained rents by 4 per cent, particularly with respect to new tenancies;

— no progress has been made by Government in developing an affordable rental (cost rental) model of housing despite commitments dating back to 2014; and

— no affordable rental or purchase homes will be delivered by any Government scheme in 2018; and

calls on the Government to:

— immediately introduce ambitious affordable rental and purchase housing schemes led by local authorities, and where appropriate, approved housing bodies and housing cooperatives with clear annual targets for all local authorities;

— deliver 4,500 affordable homes in year one and 9,000 affordable homes in year two with an appropriate mixture of rental and purchase homes determined by local housing needs;

— deliver the affordable homes as part of mixed tenure and mixed income estates on public land;

— fund the delivery of the affordable housing schemes through a combination of the Ireland Strategic Investment Fund/Home Building Finance Ireland (HBFI), Housing Finance Agency and exchequer funding as appropriate, and provide local authorities with multi annual funding commitments to facilitate forward planning;

— design the HBFI fund to prioritise loan finance to small and medium sized builders participating in council led affordable housing schemes;

— commit appropriate public funding to all council led mixed tenure and mixed income developments for projects currently underway in O'Devaney Gardens, Oscar Traynor Park and St Michael's Estate in Dublin City, The Grange/Kilcarberry in South Dublin and Shangannagh Park in Dún Laoghaire;

— identify public sites in Cork, Waterford and Galway cities for similar large scale council led mixed income and mixed tenure developments;

— commit appropriate public funding to deliver 550 affordable homes in the Poolbeg Strategic Development Zone (SDZ) and 2,109 affordable homes in the Clonburris

— amend Part V of the Planning and Development Act, 2000, to provide for 10 per cent affordable housing in addition to the existing 10 per cent social housing requirement;

and

— introduce real rent certainty by amending the Residential Tenancies Act 2004, to link rent reviews to an index such as the Consumer Price Index.

Thousands, if not tens of thousands, of people are caught in an affordability trap. Their income is above the thresholds under which it must be to obtain social housing or social housing support, yet they are struggling to rent or buy. They are living in overpriced rental accommodation. In many instances, they are living with parents while saving for a deposit or struggling to raise the finance.

This is not just affecting first-time buyers although, rightly, much of the public debate has been focusing on those trying to get on the property ladder or renting for the first time. It also affects people in their 30s and 40s who are trapped in a property in negative equity that is too small for their expanding family. They are unable to trade up to a home appropriate to meet the needs of the families they now have. It is also affecting many older couples, particularly those coming to the end of their working lives or, perhaps, people in new relationship formations, who are just about able to manage rent but who are looking nervously to pension age. Even with a modest occupational pension, they are unable to ensure they will have secure and affordable accommodation after they retire.

One of the points that is not made often in this debate is that we face a potential pensions time bomb. The affordability of rental or purchased accommodation, either for people who have rented for their entire lives or people facing the difficulties I have outlined, is a very serious issue. We see dramatic increases in the cost of property, particularly in Dublin, where, increasingly, first-time buyers' homes can be in the region of €350,000 to €400,000, or even €450,000. Rents right across the country, in rent pressure zones or outside them, continue to rise. This does not just have an enormous impact on families and those struggling with the rising cost of rent or of home purchasing; there is also a real cost to the economy. Money is being taken out of the pockets of working people. It is money that cannot be spent in local shops and businesses. It is increasing the pressure of wage demands as families struggle with the increasing cost of living.

Fine Gael has been in government for over six years. During that entire time, not a single affordable property, to rent or to buy, has been delivered directly as a result of any central government scheme. We are now into the second year of the period covered by Rebuilding Ireland but, again, not a single affordable rental or purchasable property has been delivered as a result of any measure included in that programme. In fact, Rebuilding Ireland does not contain a single dedicated funding stream or target specifically to ensure affordable rental accommodation or affordable purchasable accommodation.

Last week I questioned the Minister on this and asked him whether he could confirm whether any affordable units would be delivered this year through Government schemes. He was not able to answer with the information he had in front of him at the time. I speculate that there will not be any units delivered through cost rental or affordable purchase initiatives by the end of this year.

I note with interest the increasing demands from Fianna Fáil since Christmas for the Government to deliver more on housing. I welcome this. Fianna Fáil's record in recent years on this issue has not given much hope to struggling families, however. The confidence and supply agreement, while having a very vague reference to housing, does not propose any scheme or include any actual targets or funding commitments to deliver affordable rental or purchasable housing. In fact, Fianna Fáil has facilitated, through abstention, two Government budgets that have failed to put anything significant into this area. The last pre-budget submission by Fianna Fáil in the run-up to budget 2018 had no specific proposals on affordable housing, no commitments on funding, and no demands regarding targets. Therefore, while I welcome the increase in demand from Fianna Fáil for the Government to do more, it seems "hares and hounds" is probably a more appropriate description of the current state of play in this matter.

With regard to what the Government itself is doing, let us look at the record. I have no doubt the Minister will talk about the help-to-buy scheme introduced by his predecessors in the Departments responsible for finance and housing. There is growing evidence, however, that the scheme is actually contributing to rising house price inflation for first-time buyers. It is certainly not making homes more affordable for modest-income families. The local infrastructure housing activation fund is worth over €200 million and there is to be another round but, despite repeated requests from me and other Deputies for clear indications as to the levels of affordability this public investment will deliver, no evidence has been forthcoming. I know from a number of projects whose contractual details I have seen that there will be nothing within an affordable range for a family earning between €45,000 and €75,000 in Dublin. If the Minister would like to answer some of these questions, which he has evaded so far in responses to parliamentary questions, I would be more than happy to hear him.

I welcomed the €25 million affordability fund announced in the budget. It is far too small, however. According to the Minister here in December, it will deliver, at best, 650 units over two years. I doubt that any of these will be delivered this year. We need thousands of such units, not hundreds.

We have witnessed the continued failure of the Government to act on a commitment first made in 2014 in the plan of former Minister, Deputy Alan Kelly, and then in the plan of the current Minister's predecessor, Deputy Simon Coveney, and in Rebuilding Ireland for a genuinely affordable rental or cost rental model. Last week, the current Minister announced what we have already known for many months, namely, that there is to be a pilot scheme in this regard. So far, however, there has been no progress.

The problem is that the Government's focus is all wrong. Driving private supply does not, in and of itself, automatically guarantee affordability. I am not opposed to supply. It is good but unless there are specific measures designed to ensure real affordability, one does not automatically follow the other. Helping people to buy overpriced homes, through increased access to credit, for example, is not helping people in the long run, certainly not those unable to obtain affordable homes. The Government's focus has to be on reducing the cost of the units at the purchase point through a range of measures. While some actions can be taken, the best way to achieve this is for the State to invest directly in the building and sale of homes on public land at affordable prices. This means that, for the family earning between €45,000 and €75,000 per year, houses must be available for sale between €170,000 and, at the very top end in Dublin, €260,000. If that can be achieved at the low interest rate provided by the Minister in his revised local authority mortgage scheme, all the better. This means local authorities need to have sites, targets and funding, not through the cumbersome land initiative scheme that is currently operating and over which there are many question marks.

Sinn Féin proposed in its alternative budget last year a number of funding mechanisms for affordable rental, building and sale that would, if implemented, deliver 4,500 units in the first year and potentially 9,000 in the second. Funding could come through from the Housing Finance Agency and Ireland Strategic Investment Fund. I urge the Minister to consider targeting the Home Building Finance Ireland fund and the funds that will come through it specifically for small and medium-sized builders working with local authorities on council land to create affordable housing within the price range I have mentioned.

I also urge the Minister to stop insisting that the private sector can do this better and to empower local authorities to develop good quality, mixed-income, mixed-tenure estates on local authority land. I know the Minister is currently looking at that with respect to St. Michael's Estate and the Shanganagh project in Dún Laoghaire. I would welcome more progress in that regard, but many of us have increasing concerns about the projects in O'Devaney Gardens, Oscar Traynor Road and the Grange in my constituency in Clondalkin due to the way the models are structured, and that because of the involvement of the private sector there will be a low number of or no genuinely affordable homes to rent or purchase. If that is the case, then the very guarded willingness Sinn Féin has had up to this point while waiting to see where the process goes will very quickly evaporate and we will not be able to support those plans.

The strategic development zones hold significant opportunities. I acknowledge the work the Minister and his Department did on the Poolbeg SDZ to ensure there was a higher level of affordable units involved in it. This week South Dublin County Council is finalising the Clonburris SDZ involving more than 8,000 homes with proper infrastructure and amenities if the plan is right but, crucially, we could have 2,000 social homes and 2,000 genuinely affordable homes within that SDZ if the Minister were to make the right kind of commitments.

With respect to rent, not only do we need to see the affordable rent model, which could equally be done through the local authorities and approved housing bodies on the scale that I have outlined, but we need real rent certainty. The rent pressure zones have not worked. They will not work in the future and we need to return to a real debate about linking rent reviews to an index such as the CPI.

I welcome the Labour Party amendment which is friendly and in the spirit of our motion and we will support it. However, I am not willing to accept what are essentially alternative motions from others, although I must say there is a huge degree of consistency between the Sinn Féin motion and the Solidarity-People Before Profit amendment. Taking aside a few targets there is not really much difference between them.

Unless the Minister starts to set real targets, invest real funds and have local authorities lead the delivery of a significant stream of social and affordable housing, the housing crisis will continue to get worse and those struggling, working families that desperately need affordable rental or purchase accommodation will once again be left out in the cold.

I call Deputy Pat Buckley. I remind Sinn Féin Members that Deputies Buckley, Funchion, Stanley and Quinlivan are sharing time and they should observe the clock.

This is not just about bricks and mortar it is about families and individuals having a home. In ten years' time we could possibly see more mental health issues arising from the ashes of this housing crisis. Many families might never have a place to call home if we continue with the current Government policy. They may never have a neighbour to call on as hotels do not do neighbours, only customers. Children might never have a pet or a garden to play in. Children's sleepovers will be just a story from the past.

The current housing crisis is having a detrimental effect on individuals and families. I deal with housing issues every single day and to be honest the situation, as we all know, is getting worse. Mothers cry on the phone telling me they are at breaking point and they cannot cope. Fathers feel totally inadequate as they cannot provide a proper place for their family to call a home. Others are couch surfing while others still wake up every day wondering if the bank will be after them next. What do we say to those people? What answers can we give?

In times of crisis or emergency all appropriate resources are made available to address the situation so that we can come out at the other end with the best possible results. It is called planning. The Fine Gael-Fianna Fáil confidence and supply arrangement never had a plan. We need to invest in people and invest locally. We need to introduce affordable rent and house purchase schemes which would be led by local authorities, housing bodies and housing co-operatives which would have the support of the Government. I commend my comrade, Deputy Ó Broin, for bringing the motion forward tonight. He has set out clear and achievable targets. I appeal to all Members of the House to support the motion.

I am pleased to have an opportunity to speak on this motion as housing is probably one of the biggest issues I deal with in the constituency of Carlow-Kilkenny. Today in Carlow there are 30 properties available to rent in the entire county and 32 properties are available in Kilkenny. How is anybody supposed to be able to afford to even rent a home let alone buy one? Purchasing a home is going further and further out of people's reach.

I wish to focus on the people that are trying desperately to stay out of emergency accommodation. They are staying on sitting room floors, spare bedrooms and living in completely unsuitable, overcrowded and stressful situations because they do not want to have to bring their children into a hotel. We really need to do something for those people. We have come in to talk about the housing crisis on so many occasions and I think we have become a little desensitised to it. It is nearly normal now for people to be in emergency accommodation. It is normal for children to grow up in hotel rooms. That is not the kind of society we should strive to achieve. We need to provide mortgages for affordable housing to give people an opportunity to own their home and to give them something to work for. We also need to see affordable rent because part of the problem, which is putting pressure on local authority housing lists, is that people either have to leave properties because their rent is increasing and they cannot afford it or they have received a notice to quit.

We have a serious crisis on our hands and part of the solution is contained in the proposals outlined in Deputy Ó Broin's motion. I urge the Government to take them on board and to look at them because we cannot just keep talking about the crisis. More and more families face homelessness and very difficult situations. We need to deliver affordable rent options and affordable homes so they have the opportunity to own their own home one day.

I welcome the opportunity to speak on this motion. We have a crisis right across the country. Sinn Féin recognised that we have a housing crisis more than two years ago. I hope that is now accepted. It is all too apparent and clear to see. In counties such as Laois one can see it every day. There is an absence of affordable housing and people are being pushed from the market with ever-rising prices and denied the opportunity to buy their own home or avail of social housing.

Plans for local authority housing in County Laois amount to 36 houses in Portlaoise, ten in Ballyroan, six in Mountrath, ten in Mountmellick and 20 in Portarlington. That is a total of 87 council houses. To put the situation in context, the council waiting list is 1,800 households so at the current rate of building it would take up to 23 years to address the list.

That brings me to affordability. The maximum income threshold for entitlement to social housing is too low at €25,000. For a family of four in County Laois it is €26,750. A person earning that amount cannot afford to buy a house. Those who are over the limit need an affordable home. Sinn Féin supports the right of people to be able to buy an affordable house in a properly mixed area. We need a plentiful supply of housing. I heard the Minister and other Ministers say that if one had a great supply of housing the prices would go down but a plentiful supply does not guarantee lower prices. In 2006 more than 90,000 units were built and prices skyrocketed. I remember it. One could not buy a house. Prices were rising by the week. We need to moderate house prices and have a plentiful supply of social housing and affordable housing and rent controls will help the Minister to achieve that.

We also need to amend Part V of the Planning and Development Act to provide 10% of new developments for affordable housing. The affordable housing must be properly dispersed in an estate. Developers should not be allowed to lump social and affordable housing into one corner. I can point the Minister to terrible examples. We must disperse housing. The estate I live in has affordable and social housing that is dispersed around the estate. That works well and one cannot tell the difference between housing types or whether a house is a council house, an affordable house or a private house as they all look the same.

Investment is also required. I accept that will cost money. Irish pension funds are being invested abroad and could be used to finance social and affordable housing. My colleague has made suggestions. The credit union movement reckons that it has more than €8 billion to invest. Progress is at a snail's pace. We need the housing programme to be accelerated dramatically.

In Limerick house prices have risen by 7.4% in the past 12 months. Rents in my constituency rose by 19.1% in the past 12 months and the Government stands idly by and does not do much in that regard. Thousands of people are working hard across the State trying to earn enough to pay for the cost of living and to afford ridiculous rent prices. How on earth can they also strive to earn enough to buy their own homes? The Taoiseach stood in this Chamber last week and said some people could get a loan from their parents for a deposit or go abroad to work to earn some extra money.

First of all, most people, certainly most people I know, cannot get a loan from their parents. Why on earth should we accept that Irish people have to travel abroad or emigrate to earn good money? Why can citizens not earn good money here? The economy is supposedly flowing, but wages are so low that Irish people still need to emigrate. This is an incredible viewpoint from An Taoiseach. I was gobsmacked by the Taoiseach's comments at the time. It is, therefore, no surprise to me that the Government has no real interest in addressing this problem.

The most frustrating thing is that it need not be this way. Sinn Féin has put forward solutions to these problems but those in the Government are intent on ignoring everyone apart from themselves regardless of the damage this is causing. The motion from Deputy Eoin Ó Broin and Sinn Féin rightly calls on the Government to commit to immediately introduce ambitious affordable rental and house purchase schemes led by local authorities. The aim is to deliver 4,500 affordable homes in year 1 and 9,000 affordable homes in year 2 with an appropriate mix of rental or purchase homes determined by local authority needs. Moreover, the aim is to deliver affordable homes as part of mixed tenure and mixed income estates on public land.

Yesterday, the Minister was in my constituency in Limerick and he was most welcome. He opened the new Lord Edward Street housing development. He described the development as an excellent model for tackling the housing crisis. He referred to taking old buildings in important parts of the community and giving new purpose to them and bringing new life into that part of the community. I could not agree more with the Minister but the problem is the Government is not doing enough of this. We need more developments like the Lord Edward Street development in addition to new and comprehensive initiatives aimed at delivering affordable houses as well. The Minister needs to accept ideas and proposals from Opposition parties. Fine Gael has been in government for seven years and Fine Gael solutions are clearly not working.

I move amendment No. 4:

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

“— notes that the Government, through its Rebuilding Ireland Action Plan for Housing and Homelessness, has prioritised measures to stimulate housing supply at more affordable prices and rents;

— acknowledges that the initial primary focus has been on delivering homes for households in the lowest income brackets, through the commitment of over €6 billion to deliver 50,000 new social housing homes by 2021, with a further 88,000 qualifying households being supported under other programmes, primarily the Housing Assistance Payment scheme;

— welcomes the progress made in 2017, when almost 26,000 households had their social housing needs met, nearly 5,000 ahead of target;

— notes that the Government has also implemented a suite of measures to reactivate residential construction activity more generally and support its capacity to deliver more affordable homes, through, inter alia:

— fast-track planning reforms and more flexible planning guidelines;

— over €200 million investment in the Local Infrastructure Housing Activation Fund (LIHAF), supporting infrastructure to open up housing lands, with proportionate affordability dividends for house purchasers;

— bringing forward large-scale mixed-tenure housing projects, with social, affordable and private housing, on publicly-owned lands;

— the Help to Buy Scheme scheme to assist first-time buyers to meet their deposit requirements; and

— that all relevant activity indicators show significant upward trends in activity;

— acknowledges the initiatives in Budget 2018 to remove obstacles to building more homes more quickly, by:

— investing more in direct house-building by the State;

— removing the Capital Gains Tax incentive to hold on to residential land;

— escalating penalties for land hoarding; and

— providing a new, more affordable finance vehicle for builders through House Building Finance Ireland (HBFI);

— welcomes the introduction of targeted and time-bound measures to limit excessive rent increases through Rent Pressure Zones, and to provide further protections and effective support services to both tenants and landlords; and

— commends the Government on the further range of housing affordability measures now being introduced including:

— a new Rebuilding Ireland Home Loan, which will provide long-term, fixed-rate mortgages for first-time buyers;

— a new Affordable Purchase Scheme, which will see affordable homes built initially on State land, in co-operation with local authorities;

— the €25 million Serviced Sites Fund which will provide funding for local authorities to make low-cost serviced sites available for the delivery of affordable housing;

— the plans being developed by local authorities to deliver significant numbers of affordable homes through the publicly-owned land bank, with potential for more than 3,000 new affordable homes projected from existing sites as the first step towards the Government’s ambition for at least 10,000 affordable homes over the years ahead;

— the ambition to make cost rental a major part of the Irish housing system, learning from the pilot cost rental project currently being progressed in Dublin;

— a second LIHAF infrastructural investment fund which will be launched in the first half of 2018, to facilitate the opening up of more lands for early development and deliver additional homes at more affordable prices; and

— the finalisation of new ‘Build to Rent’ and ‘co-living’ planning guidelines to encourage development and investment in new forms of rental accommodation at more affordable rents.”

I thank Sinn Féin for putting down this motion and for the opportunity to discuss housing affordability. When I came to this office as Minister, I said clearly that housing affordability would be a key issue for me and for the Government. Much of the work in my Department is focused rightly on the provision of social housing for those in most pressing need. The Government is determined to increase the stock of social housing by 50,000 homes by 2021. Under Rebuilding Ireland - Action Plan for Housing and Homelessness some €6 billion in funding is securely ring-fenced to do this. Thus, when parties in the House claim that we are not investing in social housing, they are wrong. After our first 18 months of work we are ahead of target. However, Rebuilding Ireland - Action Plan for Housing and Homelessness is a five-year plan to fix our broken housing sector to bring us back to a steady state. Of course the progress we have made does not diminish the need for people struggling in our communities who are above the social housing thresholds but who cannot afford to rent or buy their own home to be supported by the State.

With tens of thousands of new homes planned to be built throughout the country in the coming years, we must ensure that they are affordable. There is a clear plan of action to achieve this. We have worked to remove costs and obstacles for builders to make projects viable in order that they can deliver more affordable homes. To achieve this, we have taken action by streamlining planning with a new fast-track process for large developments. There will be 10,000 homes under pre-consultation under that new process. A total of 5,000 are still under consideration and there have been decisions on 3,000 of these homes within the timelines agreed.

We have initiated a dedicated €200 million infrastructure fund under the local infrastructure housing activation fund, which is essentially paying the development levies upfront to get new land banks open more quickly and at more affordable prices. We have also developed new apartment guidelines to remove unnecessary costs. Such costs are significant for the building of apartments. As we announced earlier today, we have agreed the terms by which we will establish home building finance Ireland, a new State-funded bank to provide competitive loans for builders.

These actions and others have helped to resuscitate the residential construction industry and they are facilitating the construction of thousands of new homes at more affordable prices. By taking these steps to address underlying structural problems for the construction industry, the Government is also doing more on housing affordability. Specifically, as announced on 22 January, we are doing this in three ways: the Rebuilding Ireland home loan; an affordable purchase scheme; and an affordable rental scheme. The measures are targeted at households with low to moderate income with a maximum of €50,000 for a single applicant or €75,000 for joint applicants. With the new Rebuilding Ireland home loan, a person or couple can purchase a home while ensuring they can still keep their monthly repayments to one third of their net disposable income. The fixed rate is between 2% and 2.25% interest for 25 to 30 years. Thus, people will have absolute certainty of repayments over the lifetime of the loan. There is no risk of the mortgage rate rising and so no threat to their ability to afford repayments, giving them affordability and certainty as well as security.

In the greater Dublin area, Cork and Galway the maximum market value is €320,000. In the rest of the country it is €250,000. Up to the end of October of last year, two thirds, or over 5,300 homes, of the overall number of houses purchased by first-time buyers in the greater Dublin area, Cork and Galway were purchased for less than €320,000. Throughout the rest of the country, a little over 90%, or 3,380 homes, of the overall number of houses purchased by first-time buyers were purchased for less than €250,000.

Eligibility criteria apply for the Rebuilding Ireland home loan. An applicant must demonstrate that he or she is able to afford the loan repayments. There is already an extraordinary response to the new loan offering and the call centre has had to double its staff to deal with inquiries. While a mortgage and deposit are obviously crucial and the Government has made them far more accessible, they are no good to buyers if they cannot find a new home or cannot afford to buy. Therefore, the Government is also introducing a new affordable purchase scheme. Under the new scheme, local authorities will oversee the delivery of affordable homes from their land bank. Importantly, the new scheme is based on the relevant provisions of the Housing (Miscellaneous Provisions) Act 2009, which will be commenced shortly. The 2009 Act emanated from a review of affordable housing schemes by the Affordable Homes Partnership in 2007. Once the legislative provisions are commenced, I will develop detailed regulations covering the operation of the scheme, including the full eligibility criteria. Elected members of each local authority will then have a key role in determining the order of priority for the sale of affordable homes to eligible households. The income limits are consistent with the new loan at €50,000 and €75,000. The maximum discount permissible under the Act is 40%. The eventual sales price will vary from site to site depending on costs, the discount given and other relevant factors. One key change to the new scheme will see local authorities taking a fully repayable equity share to the value of the discount given in all homes sold. The funds repaid will be recycled into the provision of more affordable housing in order that many more people can be assisted under the scheme.

In Dublin a three-bedroom home that is currently out of reach for many at €320,000 could be sold for €250,000 or less under the scheme depending on the site. The potential of the scheme to help is significant.

We have signalled our intent for some time and local authorities are supportive of the new scheme. Following the housing summit last week local authorities are now examining the potential for their respective affordable housing programmes. There is particular emphasis on Dublin, Galway and Cork where the greatest affordability gap arises. The overall scale of delivery and timescales will be informed by these responses.

I am keen to see our ambitious targets realised but we need to be pragmatic about the pace of delivery across local authorities. The review of the affordable scheme in 2007 found that previous Administrations set unrealistic targets based on the potential from land. The targets did not take a realistic account of the lead-in time that would be required to translate the identification of sites into new homes.

Sinn Féin started with a target of 3,000 or 4,000 homes under the Government's affordable purchase scheme. I announced land and funding for an initial 3,000 homes with ambition for 10,000 homes under the scheme. I am hopeful that local authorities will be able to exceed this. To provide for areas and sites that need it, I am also allocating funding of €25 million during 2018 and 2019 for this targeted programme. This was announced in the budget for 2018 although other parties claimed nothing was announced in the budget for affordability. We also announced an increase in the second round of the local infrastructure housing activation fund of €50 million to again provide affordable purchase scheme homes and affordable homes. Again, parties claim that nothing was done for affordability in the last budget when that is clearly not the case.

Local authorities will make low-cost serviced sites available to approved housing bodies or co-operative housing associations in specific areas. This approach has worked well in Ballymun and I am keen to see it delivered on a greater scale in other areas. This concept is not new to local authorities. My Department, working with Dublin City Council, has facilitated this approach for the affordable 20% of the O'Devaney Gardens development, which is advancing through procurement. Let us allow local authorities to do their work and we can set realistic targets with them rather than for them.

Reference was made to increasing the Part V requirement to 20%. I believe this would be premature. For one thing, Part V failed in the past when it failed to deliver social housing homes in new mixed tenure housing estates. The regime was changed in 2015 and planning authorities are prioritising the acquisition of social houses on sites when making Part V agreements. For now, delivering social housing under Part V will continue to be the focus. Furthermore, to impose such a condition on new sites and schemes at the time we are trying to remove additional costs and see more houses built could undermine these schemes resulting in no new housing and, crucially, no new social housing. We can do it another way with our own land and we will under the affordable purchase scheme.

Reference was made to Poolbeg strategic development zone. Of the 3,500 homes planned to be delivered on these lands, it is intended that 350 units, or 10%, will be delivered as social units under Part V. In addition, a further 550 units, or over 15%, would be delivered under a commercial agreement with the majority earmarked for affordable homes but with potential for additional social housing, particularly designed for older people. That is welcome. While the progression of the planning scheme is ultimately a matter for Dublin City Council, I am committed to working with the council to deliver these mixed tenure units in what is a key site for the sustainable development of Dublin city.

Against the background of the affordability pressures that exist in the rental market in Dublin and elsewhere, the Government is determined to make affordable or cost rental a major part of the Irish housing system. A pilot project is currently being progressed by Dún Laoghaire-Rathdown County Council in conjunction with the Housing Agency and an approved housing body.

I expect this pilot to go to the market later in the year in order to secure a development partner and the best value for the State and prospective renters. Building on the experience of the pilot, my Department will lead an expert group to provide advice on the most appropriate way forward in delivering a more sustainable sector. I am considering the terms of reference, formation and composition of the group with a view to establishing it in the coming weeks.

In parallel, discussions are ongoing with the European Investment Bank regarding its experience in developing and supporting cost rental and other affordable models that could also work in Ireland. In other parts of Europe, cost rental is a significant part of the rental market. We need to make it a significant part of our rental market but this cannot be achieved overnight.

The delivery of affordable housing will rely on the State developing the full potential of its significant residential landbank. The residential land management and development group will play a key role in driving delivery as speedily as possible. The group will work with local authorities in the development of the existing State residential landbank of 2,000 ha. It will also assess the requirements for local authorities to secure additional land for social and affordable housing.

The issue of land is also being considered in the context of the new national planning framework, NPF. The Government is considering the establishment of a new public development and renewal agency under the NPF to work with local authorities. It will need to have the power and capacity to either use public lands or buy lands in the right locations for future public and private housing provision that will be affordable for housing providers to develop and for people to buy or rent. As part of this broader consideration, the regime available to local authorities to secure new residential land is also being examined, taking account of the recent past when local authorities bought a significant amount of land for housing on which they incurred substantial debt. In this context, compulsory purchase orders are being considered as part of the Law Reform Commission's examination of compulsory purchase order legislation. The Kenny report will also be reviewed.

The residential construction sector is recovering and thousands of new homes are being built every year. In 2017, more than 17,500 new homes commenced construction, which is three times as many as in 2016. Significant efforts and resources are being invested in the construction of new social homes to help those who need our help most. Recognising the need to do more for those who are struggling with housing costs, the Government is bringing forward a set of measures that will make buying and renting a house much more affordable. These initiatives are important additional steps in building capacity and ambition in the housing system to create a more affordable and sustainable housing sector and ease the financial burden and uncertainty on many people.

Fianna Fáil will be moving amendment No. 1. I commend Sinn Féin on introducing the motion and thank Sinn Féin Deputies for their support and commendation for my party's recent pronouncements and proposals in this area. I will briefly outline the contents of the Fianna Fáil Party amendment to the motion. Like others, my party recognises that the housing crisis is a national economic, social and moral challenge. We call on the Dáil to recognise the need, which has been lost on the Government, for an affordable housing scheme to dampen down unsustainable property price rises and ensure ordinary families have an opportunity to seek to secure home ownership.

The House should also criticise the Fine Gael decision in 2012 to abolish an affordable housing scheme; the failure of the Government to adequately invest in social and affordable housing since 2011; and the failure of Fine Gael in government to honour its commitment in budget 2016 to spend €10 million on an affordable rental model. This is only one of many commitments the Government failed to live up to but it is one which is worth noting because, as my party has argued numerous times since this Dáil first met, a large cohort of people who cannot get on social housing waiting lists or afford homes are not being accommodated by the State via local authorities.

Consequently, the Dáil should again call on the Government to launch a new off-balance sheet housing delivery agency to deliver social and affordable homes and, as Deputy Stanley and others have argued, take advantage of the commitment made by the credit union movement to invest €8 billion in this area. We should also allow Irish pension funds to invest in social and affordable homes and secure a return which would benefit all of society. The Minister alluded to an agency the Government is considering establishing and what such an agency could do. A new housing delivery agency should compulsorily acquire and develop State and State agency land in key areas of demand.

I hope Deputies will support my call on the Government to reduce construction costs associated with the building trade in order to make it more viable. It could address development charges and certification costs and bring forward its commitment in the previous budget to establish a fund of €750 million that would offer development finance at a competitive rate. Fianna Fáil insisted on the establishment of this fund but we have not even seen the mechanics of it, not to speak of progress towards having this issue addressed.

The Dáil should also call on the Government to initiate a new tenant purchase scheme. While the scheme introduced by the former Minister, Deputy Alan Kelly, was well-intentioned, unfortunately it did not provide local authority tenants with an opportunity to avail of home ownership at an affordable level. It should recognise again that, not only did the Fine Gael Party abolish an affordable housing scheme, but it also reduced to 10% the Part V requirement for 20% social and affordable housing in private housing schemes. We advocate restoring the Part V requirement to 20%. I have provided a concise summary of the amendment, which is focused on specific ways in which this issue should have been addressed many moons ago. As we have often heard, however, it is never too late to do the right thing.

In proposing the motion, Deputy Ó Broin referred to the confidence and supply arrangement. While the arrangement does not take control of the Government, as that privilege was given to those who secured a majority in the Dáil, albeit on the basis of convoluted figures, the arrangement specifically states that the Government would significantly expedite the delivery of social housing units. Thus far, it has not done so. We will see what, if any, progress has been made when we review the confidence and supply arrangement. The agreement also states that the Government will initiate an affordable housing scheme. Again, it has not yet done so, nor has it put forward an affordable cost rental model for the private rented sector despite the commitment to do so.

Last week, the Government referred to a pilot scheme on an affordable cost rental scheme. The time for a pilot has long since past. A universal affordable scheme should be introduced. The Government also made a commitment to remove barriers to private housing supplier but has not done anything in that regard.

As I noted this evening and on many previous occasions, the Government has not taken action on the cost of finance, development and certification costs and the rate of VAT levied on construction. I make no apologies for calling for measures in these areas because they would assist those who are able to address the affordability issue. The key to affordability is supply and the key to supply is cost. The measures I propose would assist the building sector, specifically trades such as blocklayers, plasterers and electricians and so forth who also need assistance. This is a way in which they could contribute and they would be more than glad to do so.

I support the Fianna Fáil amendment. I will briefly outline the reasons the Sinn Féin motion is playing politics with the serious efforts being made by everyone in this Chamber to address the housing crisis. Having spoken on many housing motions, I am often struck by the high level of commonality that is a feature of them. However, when I examined the Sinn Féin motion, I was struck by its partisan political nature. I was shocked, if not surprised, that housing is a political battlefield for Sinn Féin rather than a social problem that affects too many of our citizens. Sinn Fein's selfish tactics involve attacking all attempts to create agreed solutions, while cynically running away from any responsibility for taking a decision.

The motion attacks my party for trying to get the Government to deliver affordable housing solutions.

I could hardly believe it. It has the brass neck to attack Fianna Fáil, who after the 2016 general election, took our duties-----

Deputy Casey has a brass neck to argue it.

One speaker, please.

I did not interrupt the Deputy. Sinn Féin has the brass neck to attack Fianna Fáil, which after the 2016 general election took its duty to the Irish people seriously and facilitated the formation of a Government. What did Sinn Féin do? It ran away from the responsibility and bided its time so that it could attack from the sideline. If there were all-Ireland medals handed out for hurling on the ditches, Sinn Féin would beat Kilkenny, Cork and Tipperary combined. That is the old, cynical, populist politics that has much in common with Donald Trump and the Brexiteers and is doing much to damage the difficult, painstaking but necessary work of building consensus and delivering housing solutions for all our people. I call on Sinn Féin to withdraw or at least amend the motion.

There are substantial differences between Fianna Fáil and the Fine Gael-led Government on housing. We have held its spin-driven and timid approach to housing to account time and time again. We have done so in good faith in the belief that its solutions are not addressing the problem, namely, the lack of affordable housing for all citizens who need it. We have been both relentless in holding its failures to the light of public scrutiny and constructive in our proposals. We believe a housing agency is essential both to resolve the enormous scale of Fine Gael's housing crisis and to effectively manage housing policy and stock to ensure we never have another disaster in housing.

I also dismiss and reject Fine Gael's attempts to play politics with criticism of the housing agency idea from both the Minister for Housing, Planning and Local Government, Deputy Eoghan Murphy, and the Taoiseach. They have both cynically briefed against the idea of a housing agency on the spurious and nonsensical premise that it somehow lets local authorities off the hook. Having served for 12 years on Wicklow County Council, I can assure the Minister that we in Fianna Fáil believe strongly in local authorities' central role in housing provision and will not take any spin or nonsense from him on housing agencies.

The housing agency was a key pillar recommendation from the special Committee on Housing and Homelessness on which members of Fine Gael sat. It was a cross-party recommendation and the Minister should not hide behind the spin machine of his party's strategic communications unit. He should not dismiss the cross-party consensus on a housing agency in his rush to be ahead of the curve in his news cycle-obsessed Administration.

The Goodbody housing tracker report indicates that housing output will have to treble if we are to get on top of the housing shortage. I call on the Minister to start concentrating on that. He should work with us and not against us. His affordable mortgage proposal, while welcome, is again locking too many hard-working people out of sustainable financial products that would allow them to buy their own home. The housing agency would provide necessary continuous and professional guidance on all these housing matters. The agency would co-ordinate the response, from central government objectives to local authority delivery. We in Fianna Fáil are serious about housing. We demand a hearing. We will not tolerate playing politics with people's expectations by either Sinn Féin or Fine Gael. Time is running out. Ireland deserves better. Our people deserve homes.

As my colleagues have said, my party will table our own amendment to this motion. I find it hard to take seriously Sinn Féin's interest in housing or indeed in anything. As a new Deputy here, I saw at first hand Sinn Féin running to the hills when it came to forming a Government. Its members could have had an input into policy or into Government but they ran to the hills instead. Perhaps they would have had all the answers but, alas, we will never know because they went to the hills and stayed there.

Homelessness nationally has reached crisis point. Official homeless figures for Cork South-West do not give an accurate picture. As it is a rural constituency, many houses now house three generations, which leads to its own problems, including problems with mental health. Instead of people being on the street, the houses are overcrowded.

Fianna Fáil has placed housing front and centre as a key priority. We not only talk the talk but walk the walk. We have put forward a series of Bills, such as the Vacant Housing Refurbishment Bill 2017, to get to grips with the crisis. My three constituency offices are inundated with people who are on the housing list or trying to get on the list. The Government must start delivering on houses. After four plans and after a dozen launches with bells, whistles and ribbons, action now needs to be taken. Bricks and mortar need to be put into the ground, instead of the usual spin.

Housing is one of the key issues facing the Government. Homelessness has reached unprecedented levels. Home building numbers are tens of thousands behind where they should be and approximately 100,000 people are on the social housing waiting list. All the while, ordinary workers cannot afford to own a home. All the Government offers is half-baked ideas, which it proceeds to announce three or four times for maximum public relations effect.

The impact of the latest announcement about affordable mortgages is just that another €200 million will be put into an already scarce market thereby driving prices higher. This is making home ownership for ordinary workers less likely and it leaves them with just two options. First, they can get on the housing list if they qualify or, second, they must throw themselves on the mercy of the private rental sector. In the vast majority of cases, despite the Taoiseach's revelations last week, parents are unable to help financially. The Taoiseach throwing it out there as one of a series of solutions to the housing crisis makes me very fearful for the future and it should make the ordinary working men and women of this country think very carefully of where this Taoiseach would like to lead them.

However, it would be easy to suggest that this Government's incompetence is at the root of this crisis. I believe that theory is too simple. I believe that there is a clear line of evidence since 2011 showing that Fine Gael is working to a very specific strategy. In 2011, Fine Gael took a clear line with the banks in the mortgage arrears crisis. That line was to give a free hand to the banks to clean their balance sheets, sell the impaired mortgages to vulture funds and repossess the rest. Members should remember the notion of the then Minister for Finance, Deputy Noonan, that it was in the nature of things that the vultures should clean the carcass of the recession. Thereafter, having given a free hand to the banks, Fine Gael starved local authorities of funding and any remaining experience of providing housing within the county councils was lost. This leaves us in the position that market forces will now decide who can afford to own a home. Those who cannot can deal with their landlord. Therefore, I argue that this housing crisis offers an insight into Fine Gael's view of our country. It points clearly to the fact that Fine Gael wants to run this country for the very wealthy at the expense of ordinary people.

However, there is a different way and that is where my party differs from Fine Gael. Building houses is the only solution to this problem and Fianna Fáil's track record through the decades in building social and affordable housing gives credibility to the solutions we offer. We intend to press our confidence and supply agreement with the Government to ensure this happens. Specifically, where affordable and social housing is concerned, we want to increase the capital budget, which is still 24% below 2008 levels, develop a new housing agency and create an off-balance sheet model for approved housing bodies, AHBs, to allow social innovation funds, SIFs, credit unions etc. to invest. We want a 20% Part V share of developments for construction of social and affordable homes, to use National Asset Management Agency, NAMA, and bank share proceeds to invest in social housing and to accelerate void refurbishment with self-refurbishment and claim back proceeds. We intend to establish a new affordable home purchase scheme on State lands and to establish an affordable rent scheme on State land. It is now imperative that we think outside the box, put a housing policy in place that serves the ordinary people of this county and roll back from the extreme right-wing policies with which this Taoiseach and his Government want to drag us down.

I wish to bring forward a few thoughts as to why we are continually making announcements on re-launches of housing plans and are falling short of our targets every time. It is an unending circle.

For example, this time last year, a repair-and-lease scheme was announced under which disused properties in towns and villages and, indeed, in the countryside were to be brought back into use. A loan of €40,000 would be given to a homeowner to do up a property, which would, in turn, be given back to the local authority to house one of its clients. In Kerry, exactly 12 months on - and I have no doubt it is the case all over the country - the total number of houses renovated under the scheme is zero. The scheme is tied up in bureaucracy and red tape, even though numerous people are looking to have their properties done up and taken over and not one house has been finished. It has been an abject failure of the system. I do not know if the scheme is caught up in bureaucracy within the Department or the local authority or a combination of both but surely to God when a property is empty and the owner is willing to put it into the system, 12 months is enough time to get this to work. The Minister needs to cut through the red tape, which is stifling every initiative.

Reference was made to available land banks. How many properties have been built on the land banks owned by local authorities over the past number of years even though each local authority is crying out for houses? No affordable scheme has been provided. Could they think about selling off sites to people who are willing to buy them at a low cost and allowing them to build their own properties? A great deal of land is available but nothing is happening.

There is little development in the private sector because the banks are not lending. The distressed properties they hold are increasing in value every day while the housing crisis continues. It is in their interest to retain these properties to maximise their value before they lend to developers to build houses. We have a share in the banks since we bailed them out but the Government is permitting them to do this. We can come into the House week in, week out to discuss launches and policies. Let us cut through the red tape and build some houses.

I welcome the motion, which we support. I thank Deputy Ó Broin for indicating that Sinn Féin will accept our amendment, which seeks to implement the recommendations of the Kenny report that were designed to stop land hoarding. There is evidence that people are sitting on land to make a greater profit. This would be a long-term way of ensuring affordable land is available for social and affordable housing without developers sitting on it until they make a killing. I am seriously disappointed that the vacant sites registers are empty in a large number of local authorities. They were supposed to have the registers compiled by January of this year in order that the levy could be introduced in 2019 but a large number of them do not have sites registered and, therefore, will be unable to collect the levy next year. That is a dereliction of duty on behalf of those authorities but the Department and the Minister could have played a much stronger role in insisting that the legislation, which was passed a few years ago to provide the necessary lead-in time, was implemented by them. I hope the Minister of State, Deputy Phelan, will follow up on that within the Department.

Specific issues need to be addressed, particularly public sector construction of social and affordable housing, and the use of vacant properties. We are still awaiting the Government strategy in which it will outline what it plans to do about that. The motion addressed two issues primarily - affordable purchase and affordable rental, and rent certainty and security of tenure, which we have discussed many times in this Chamber. The two issues are very much connected because a large swathe of our population is stuck in private rented accommodation because they cannot buy. Some have chosen that option, as people do in other European countries. However, they comprise a cohort of the population whose earnings exceed the income limits for social housing or who cannot access social housing if they are within the limits. They are in the low to middle income category. The Nevin Institute suggests that this cohort could comprise up to 40% of the population that requires housing, which is significant. It is vital that this issue be addressed.

I am surprised at Fianna Fáil's sensitivity to the wording of the motion.

Deputy Casey is a sensitive fellow.

It is a good job I am not like him.

I am not sure why the party is so sensitive given how I could respond to what was said about the standing down of the affordable housing scheme in 2012. The reason for that was that few houses were being built, although they were affordable. Under Fianna Fáil, the cost of houses was very high and many people had bought at the top of the bubble and were in negative equity. Prices then dropped significantly at the bottom of the market. However, there is every reason to reintroduce the scheme now because prices are rocketing again and such a scheme is needed.

I agree with a number of Deputy Brassil's comments regarding the time it is taking to build on public land, in particular. As he said, schemes are moving at a snail's pace in his area and around the country. The Minister opened a welcome development on Edward Street in my constituency yesterday, to which Deputy Quinlivan referred. It comprises 81 lovely new homes but the planning permission for that was granted several years ago. When I was Minister, I allocated money for it but it is only coming on stream now. We need to address that. There are 700 publicly-owned sites comprising more than 1,700 ha. I understand that using a density of only 50 units per hectare that would be enough land to build more than 85,000 homes. That land is available and, according to the Government, the intention, in theory, is to have mixed-tenure social and affordable housing and perhaps not-so-affordable housing. We all know councillors in our own parties who are struggling to come up with plans that will be acceptable to the Department for the use of those sites. Reference has been made to the Poolbeg site and to St. Michael's Estate. I know a little about them and there is some positivity regarding Poolbeg but the difficulty is designing a scheme in which the homes will be affordable. With regard to St. Michael's Estate and other sites that the Dublin Deputies will be more familiar with, councillors are struggling to satisfy the Department to approve the number of social and affordable houses that people need.

My difficulty is that these sites are available to be used and there is an opportunity to build social and affordable housing if it is led properly by Government. My fear is that the toing and froing between local authorities and Government is taking too long and the opportunity will be missed. Private developers will then come in and make profits while building very little social and affordable housing on these sites. I fully support council-led housing, including the cost rental model that has been proposed and that has been well fleshed out by the Nevin Institute and others. The Ó Cualann development is an excellent model. The council provided the sites at a cost of €1,000 each and installed the necessary infrastructure. The voluntary housing association was able to build in Poppintree and provide houses for €140,000 with the highest priced unit being a four-bedroom house for €219,000. This can be done.

I know the Minister, Deputy Eoghan Murphy, has said that he would like to see that model expanded, but it is on a very small scale at the moment.

I have one question for Sinn Féin. Why has Limerick been left out when the motion calls on the Government to "identify public sites in Cork, Waterford and Galway" for developments? Perhaps Sinn Féin thinks we already have them but I am not sure that we do. Perhaps Sinn Féin might respond to that question. That was my only question to Sinn Féin. We are happy to support the motion and we welcome the fact that our amendment is being accepted.

How much time do I have?

Deputy Boyd Barrett has eight minutes. He should not feel he has to use it all.

I thank Sinn Féin for tabling its motion on the critical issue of affordable housing. We support the overall direction and thrust of its motion, but we have some additional points to make on what needs to be done with public land in terms of affordable housing. We also have what I would say are slightly more ambitious proposals about what needs to be done with regard to private development to increase the proportions of both social and affordable housing. I will expand on that. Our amendment takes on board most of the Sinn Féin motion but adds a number of points.

To the Government I would say that the broad thrust of our argument is that we must start off by recognising that the private sector is not in the business of producing not-for-profit housing. This is such a blindingly obvious point, but it is not taken on board in the policies of the two main parties. Let me repeat the point. Profit-based businesses do not do not-for-profit. That is not what they are designed for and plans to ramp up residential construction which overwhelmingly depend on the private sector will not deliver affordable and social housing in the quantities we need in order to deal with the crisis.

To cite an example, one of the biggest developments which will be built in the State is Cherrywood. It will be virtually a new town. I am going to keep talking about it because it is important. NAMA sold the lands to Hines Real Estate Ireland for a song, which was disgraceful in and of itself. Now Hines Real Estate Ireland is offering social housing built on land sold to it by the State back to the council. Does the Minister of State know what price Hines Real Estate Ireland offered for the first tranche of 1,200 of what will be 8,000 units? This offer included a discount in light of social housing obligations under Part V. One-bedroom units were offered for €243,000, two-bedroom units for €358,000 and three-bedroom units for €442,000. That is at a discount on the market price. That offer comes to a total of €41 million.

Does the Minister of State see the point? The affordable mortgage scheme is useless to people who are trying to purchase houses that will be sold at that level. The local infrastructure housing activation fund, LIHAF, was initially proposed to deliver affordable housing. The original Government proposal - its promise - was that 40% of any LIHAF supported development would be affordable and that affordability in Dublin would mean less than €300,000. Within one month, because of lobbying from the likes of Hines Real Estate Ireland, this proposal was abandoned. It is now gone. We do not know whether we will get any percentage of affordable housing in Cherrywood if affordable is to mean something that is actually affordable for people on average incomes. There is talk of as little as 2%. If one looks at the prices Hines Real Estate Ireland is proposing for the Part V 10%, however, none of it will be affordable. We are giving these guys LIHAF funding and getting nothing back. This is ridiculous.

Our motion proposes that any LIHAF funding must at least guarantee that the Government's own original proposal of 40% of units being genuinely affordable to people on average incomes will be met. We are saying that the 10% given over in such developments under Part V is not enough. We need at least 20% social housing and at least 20% affordable housing on any private development of any description, because there is no point in building houses at those prices. It is worse than useless. Even if people can take out mortgages to pay those prices, they will be in debt for the rest of their lives and we will be facing into the madness that produced the last crash. We need genuinely affordable housing, not prices that are off the Richter scale in order to profit these guys.

Similarly, all NAMA sites should be used to build social and affordable housing. Let me underline that I said both social and affordable. Nothing on a NAMA site should be sold at those kinds of market prices. It would be madness for the State to do that. No Home Building Finance Ireland supported development should be sold at those prices. All of it should be linked to affordability. Any Ireland Strategic Investment Fund supported housing development should be linked to affordability. If it is not, what is the point in doing it? There is no point. If those caveats are not put in, the only beneficiaries will be the private developers. It will be useless in dealing with our problem.

We need a mix of social and affordable housing on public sites, but affordable housing cannot be a Trojan Horse for the privatisation of public sites. Therefore, there must be an absolute condition that mixed tenure should first of all mean that the thresholds for eligibility for council housing are raised so that anybody who cannot qualify under the current thresholds up to low and middle incomes should be allowed to go onto social housing lists. That is how we get real social mix. We have to remove the stigma from social housing so that not only those on the lowest incomes are allowed to apply. Social housing should be an option for everybody. That is how to get social mix.

For those who do want to purchase, however, if the house is developed on public land, there must be a council first buy-back provision. In other words, if the house is being sold at any time in the future, it must be sold back to the council and there should be no capital gain above and beyond normal inflation. If it was bought at a discount on public land, it should be sold back to the council at the same level. It should remain affordable forever or revert to being council housing. Otherwise, it becomes a Trojan Horse for the privatisation of public land and public housing and actually depletes the stock of public housing, which led us to the mess we are in now. That must not be allowed to happen again.

Will the Government please define affordability? What is affordable? If one is on €35,000 a year, what can one afford to borrow? One cannot afford to borrow the cost of anything available on the market in most of the major cities. Affordability must be linked to the real incomes of average earners who are not eligible for social housing. If those things are not done, this is all just waffle which will go nowhere and which will not deal with the crisis of affordability and the provision of social housing. Those are our proposals. I hope the Government will take them seriously.

I thank Deputy Boyd Barrett. Our next contributor is Deputy Thomas Pringle. It is good to see him back in the House. He is welcome.

I thank the Ceann Comhairle very much.

The Deputy is sharing with Deputies Joan Collins and Catherine Connolly.

It is just Deputy Connolly as Deputy Collins is not about. I thank the Ceann Comhairle very much for the welcome back. It is good to be here but, unfortunately, some things never change. That is a bit depressing. I welcome the opportunity to speak on this motion tonight because it is important. First of all, it is interesting to look at some of the amendments to the motion as proposed because they are interesting in many ways. Fianna Fáil see this as a moral issue, which is gas coming from Fianna Fáil. Fine Gael is definitely continuing the housing crisis that Fianna Fáil started as a moral campaign. Then we have the Labour Party, which has suddenly seen that there should be legislation on the compensation paid by local authorities for land bought. We would be forgiven for thinking that if it was in government, it would have passed such legislation. It was in government though and it did not do anything on it, yet now it is championing it.

The Government might even argue that there is no need to do anything, based on its publications on the issue, especially the summary of social housing assessments 2017.

If that was the source of one's information, there would actually be no problem at all. According to the document, for example, there were only 903 families on the housing list in Donegal in 2017, down from 1,267 in 2016. So what are we talking about? There is no problem. What the Government does not bother telling anyone, however, is that these figures do not include HAP tenants, whose needs have apparently been met. Unfortunately, that is the issue. The Government does not see that there is a problem. People "choose" to be homeless. Ministers have stated that this is a common crisis in other countries, so we should therefore just accept the situation. That is the Government's mantra.

This motion is about getting the Government to accept that there is a problem so that it can be addressed. That is not what the Government sees, though. One line from its response says it all, in that the Government "welcomes the progress made in 2017, when almost 26,000 households had their social housing needs met". That is amazing. It would be lovely to see where this happened.

While I agree with the motion's intention to deliver homes via affordable houses that people could buy through schemes, existing houses could be used. I would like to see houses that are lying empty around the country used. We have all seen the relevant figures. Some put the number at over 3,000 in Dublin alone, yet families here are living in hotels. Apparently, AIB had 713 houses on its books at the end of 2016. As far as I know, we own that bank. Surely those houses could have been made available for people in need, but they could not because that would have reduced the cost of houses in the State and thereby affect the value of the bank, and we could not have that.

The Government is paying lip service to all social housing and affordable housing is no exception. We hear all of the fancy talk and see plans being launched, but we do not see anything happening on the ground except for reports being manipulated. Listening to the Minister's contribution this evening, it seems that we will have even more lip service and no action. Everything is being considered and nothing is actually being done.

The only way we can ensure that something is done is to get rid of Fine Gael from government and make sure that it is not replaced by Fianna Fáil. We might then see some progress.

I support the motion, as an affordable housing scheme is urgently needed, and I thank Sinn Féin for moving it. However, it is only a small part of what is required to deal with the national housing emergency. That is what it is, an emergency, and it is important to name it. Without recognising and naming the problem, it is not possible to do what is required, namely, produce an overall comprehensive housing policy within which the provision of homes for our people is seen as a fundamental human right, a prerequisite to a functioning democracy and an essential element of any country that describes itself as a republic.

What we have had to date, however, are policies that have tinkered with the system in a piecemeal manner, from rent pressure zones that, from my experience in Galway, have not worked, a help-to-buy scheme that has actively promoted the market, an allocation of money for affordable homes that, while welcome, is so minute as to make no difference, and a vacant site levy that has been delayed in its implementation.

All of these tinkering, piecemeal initiatives are fundamentally premised on the belief of this and the previous Government, including the Labour Party, that the private market will provide what are described as "accommodation units". Not only is there an utter failure to recognise that such housing policies are a major cause of the ongoing emergency, but, even worse, the Government is, in the guise of misnaming social housing, actively promoting the private market. The past and current Governments have promoted the housing assistance payment. Following its introduction, we in Galway city were told throughout my 17 years as a councillor and up to the present day that HAP was the only game in town.

The emergency has arisen not by accident or overnight but, as with the health service, as a deliberate consequence of this and the previous Government's belief that the market would provide. It is a scandal that, 70 years after the Universal Declaration of Human Rights - interestingly, that was the same year that Dr. Noël Browne tried to introduce his mother and baby comprehensive scheme - set out in Article 25.1 that everyone had "the right to a standard of living adequate for the health and well-being of himself [or herself] ... including food, clothing, housing and medical care", the most basic fundamental right to shelter and a home is still lacking. Not only is that bad, but the use of language and statistics to hide it is frightening.

I live in a city where I know for a fact that approximately 5,000 households are on the waiting list. One that I am familiar with has been waiting since 2002. In those 16 years, that household has never been offered a house. In the Department's document, however, I have suddenly found out that, although the Galway city housing crisis has not been solved, it has been magically reduced. The city has gone from 3,322 households on the waiting list to 2,219. That 33% reduction in nine months is the largest percentage drop in the whole of the country. Nine months is a pregnancy time, but how did anyone manage to reduce that number when we have not had a single directly built house in Galway city since 2009? One must ask what is going on in my city of Galway where there is no overall plan for our land. We have no shortage of land or public space in the docks and Ceannt Station. Two thirds of the land that we bought at high prices for a road that is going nowhere have been sterilised. Someone is erecting office blocks for 2,700 workers without accommodation, but that issue has been got around by erecting accommodation for overseas students who will pay a fortune.

We are back to the developer-led business as usual in Galway city despite all of these documents, including Rebuilding Ireland. While the Government actually is rebuilding Ireland, it is once again doing so in the developer's name while depriving our people of homes. That is unacceptable. Without a home and security of tenure, people cannot participate in a democracy. Clearly, that is what the Government wants.

I welcome the opportunity to contribute on this important motion. In A Programme for a Partnership Government, the Government made a promise: "Providing affordable, quality and accessible housing for our people is a priority for the New Partnership Government." In fact, this is the very first line under the general vow to end the housing shortage and homelessness. It is sad to say that the shortage of housing has not been reduced in the two years since the Government regained power. If anything, the demand for housing and accommodation has increased.

I have spoken on the housing crisis numerous times in the Dáil. Every time I do, the homeless figures have increased. There were 8,587 people homeless across Ireland in the week of 25-31 December 2017. That includes adults and children. The number of families becoming homeless has increased by more than 17% since December 2016.

The need is not just to create accessible accommodation for these people, but to make it affordable as well. Last year's €90 million help-to-buy scheme has been driving up house prices and doing the opposite of what was intended. It is urgent that the compulsory purchase and development of land and landbanks currently tied up in NAMA in key areas of demand is seen to, as is re-introducing the affordable housing scheme that the Fine Gael Government wrongly scrapped in 2012.

All of the schemes that the Minister, his predecessor and the Government have introduced are aimed at first-time buyers. However, they have been leaving behind those who fell victim to the economic downturn, whose houses were repossessed or sold due to the large and unattainable mortgages given to them by the banks, and those who are trying to start again but are not considered first-time buyers. I hope that the Government will take these people into consideration and allow them a second chance at owning their own homes.

In its motion, Sinn Féin mentions a number of areas around Dublin city and other major cities that are in a bad way, but this crisis reaches far beyond city boundaries. It is in every constituency in Ireland, including my own of Cork South-West. I hope that "affordable housing" will not turn out like many of the affordable sites that we have in places like Schull and Bantry in west Cork. While they were affordable initially, they became incredibly expensive and were being sold to the highest bidder. That was wrong and unfair. Young people who wanted to set up in their local communities were turned away because bidders came in to buy homes in west Cork. The House knows the popularity of some holiday resorts.

Unfortunately, that was the situation with which they were met. I cannot understand the pressure being put on so many young people. If they want to build homes or get planning permissions it costs thousands of euro. If one is granted planning permission, one then has to go to a bank only to be told one's wife, partner or oneself is not earning enough. One then goes to local authorities and is told one is earning too much. It is a mess. I meet people in my constituency of Cork South-West every week who are applying for social housing, which adds to the pressure which is already there. We all know how many families are waiting for a long time to get council houses. The Minister of State has an opportunity to set the record straight and do some good in regard to housing for the people of the country.

I too want to compliment Sinn Féin on putting down this motion. We can have motions and potions and everything else but we cannot build houses. I wish the Minister of State well. He is a saner and more approachable type of representative for Kilkenny than a previous Minister, Big Phil the enforcer.

Tá sé imithe. He has gone to greener pastures now on a big pension and wage. He destroyed the local authorities and many other things. He forced Irish Water on us.

Building houses is not rocket science. We could build them in the 1940s, 1950s, 1960s, 1980s, noughties and then everything crashed. I have to ask why that happened. Deputy Ó Broin works very hard on the housing committee but there are reports and more reports. "Rebuilding Ireland" – what a term. People who can build should be allowed to do so. I know of at least ten couples in south Tipperary who want to build, who have sites and the wherewithal to meet the cost of building houses but who cannot get planning permission. They have to have so many acres of farmland and prove they came from the area. It is almost as though the authorities want to know where they were conceived if they want to get planning. It is ridiculous.

The motion refers to affordable housing and affordable housing schemes have been brilliant. I am a proud member of Caislean Nua voluntary housing association. We delivered 17 units. It may not be 100 units but it is still 17 units. There are many such groups in the Minister of State's native county and in Deputy Ó Broin's constituency. The groups were embarrassing the Department and local councils. The system was changed so that there was only one office in Dublin. There were seven and there are now five. We go around on a merry-go-round; there is paper going up and paper going down. A document is sent to the Department of the environment, six months later it is sent to a county council for clarification and six months after that it goes up and back again. It is a disgrace. I have repeatedly asked the Minister of State, the Minister, Deputy Eoghan Murphy, and the Taoiseach to bring county managers and directors of services for housing before a committee in which we could question them. It is said we gave them money but they did not build houses or the council then says it did not get the money. If it was not so serious, it would be like a game of Russian roulette. People cannot get houses. We got rid of all the bedsits in Dublin and did many other things to damage and diminish the efforts of housing authorities.

A company in Cahir is exporting 2,500 houses a year to England. I spoke the Minister of State about it last week and he referred me to the Minister of State, Deputy English, and I will speak to him. Its houses can be constructed in seven weeks but it cannot get accreditation in Ireland. It would take 15 months and cost €100,000. It can build houses in England. The company sent 2,500 houses to local authorities in England but cannot build here.

There are vacant houses. I saw a documentary on Northern Ireland, which is the next place a committee delegation should go, something I have asked for and perhaps Deputy Ó Broin will do the same. We should see what goes on in the Northern Ireland Housing Executive. Sinn Féin has plenty of experience from Northern Ireland as to what happens there. From the time a house is vacated and the keys are handed back to the authority, it takes 12 weeks to re-let a property. Some houses are vacant for four years in Tipperary. Every Thursday night I return home and pass a house where the occupants have all died. I check to see if the lights are on, but they are not and not even a candle is lit. It is pathetic. The lethargic ineptitude of the public service which is supposed to deliver housing is disgraceful. One can blame the Minister. The former Minister, Deputy Kelly, AK47, was going to rebuild Ireland and England. He did not build a henhouse in Toomevara or a dog shed in Carrick-on-Suir. A record 11 houses were built in Tipperary over five years. At present, 3,100 people have been approved for housing and about 10,000 are waiting. It is a joke and the people are tired and weary of it. I am tired and weary of talking about it. Let the people who want to build go out and build.

I pursued the issue of vacant shops in town for years in the context of the county development plan and the council in order to allow people to convert shops which have been vacant for ten years to living accommodation without charges. Something is happening now, but it is five or six years too late. We could repopulate towns and villages and bring them back to life, and allow people to get houses. There is too much bureaucracy. We are laden down with it.

As I said, voluntary housing associations are the same. They have the ability to deliver housing but there is too much red tape and we cannot have them embarrassing the public sector because county managers might have questions to answer at council meetings. They should be brought to the Houses and asked to account for their activity or inactivity.

It is hard to follow that. Deputies Munster, Mitchell, Cullinane and Ellis are sharing time.

The Minister of State's party has been in government for seven years and we are in the midst of a housing emergency. After seven years, it still refuses point blank to roll out a properly-funded State-wide social and affordable housing building programme, despite the fact it is aware of the chronic shortage of rental properties which, in itself, is a crisis. It is also aware of the rocketing rental prices people are being charged for the few properties that are available. All of this is compounded by the fact that there is no evidence of any real effort to put forward an affordable housing programme. When I say affordable, I mean affordable for people on low and average wages.

In my constituency, Louth, the average asking price of a house has increased by 11.5%, the highest increase outside of Dublin. Rents in Louth have also increased by a staggering 16.7%, well in excess of increases in Dublin during the same period. There are no genuinely designated affordable houses for people to buy. The Minister of State knows that. We all accept that Fianna Fáil wrecked the economy and its policies forced tens of thousands of families into negative equity. We all accept that its policies forced misery on thousands of people and forced them into homelessness but Fine Gael has been in government for seven years. For those seven years, it has turned a blind eye to the situation and has allowed a crisis to develop into an emergency.

The few measures it recently introduced are merely tinkering around the edges. They will only be effective for a tiny minority of people. I simply cannot accept that the Government is so incompetent. A clear and deliberate policy has been ongoing for seven years and is compounding the misery for people year in and year out. A whole generation of people of moderate or no means are being denied the opportunity to have a permanent home.

Without the provision of affordable housing, along with social housing, we will return to the Celtic tiger era and we know how that ended thanks to Fianna Fáil. House prices are rocketing. This time around, ordinary people cannot afford to buy a home. They cannot even afford to rent a home. This is all happening on the Government's watch. It is as clear as day. If the Government cannot see what is happening, then God help us. At some stage, it will have to put an end to prolonging people's misery.

We all know we are in the middle of a housing crisis. There is a shortage in the supply of homes, yet prices continue to rise at an incredible rate. An entire generation now sees homeownership as something that is totally out of their grasp. An entire generation does not believe they will be to live in the towns or cities where their families have lived for generations.

While some wait for years on social housing lists, others, like a couple earning €55,000 or a single person earning €30,000, are told they earn too much to be considered for social housing. However, they earn nowhere near enough to buy a home in places like Dublin. When I heard the Government's plan for its new affordable homes scheme, the first thing which worried me was whether it was simply a scheme designed to clear the way for people to purchase overpriced homes from property developers. If the answer is "Yes" then we will be left with massive problems further down the track.

A section in the motion calls for the amendment of Part V of the Planning and Development Act to provide for 10% affordable housing in addition to the existing 10% social housing requirement. This is a common-sense proposal and it could make a big difference to citizens who have been left in a catch-22 situation. In my constituency, I regularly meet people caught in such situations. The Lawrence land on the Oscar Traynor Road have been lying idle for years. We were promised big developments on this land and we need to see them happen, particularly in the context of the provision of social and affordable homes. To facilitate the latter, there must be appropriate public funding. The Government needs to seriously look at working with local council to build truly affordable homes.

The Government has created what, for it at least, seems to be an intractable problem in the current housing crisis. It is more than a crisis - it is a national emergency. Buying a house, particularly in Dublin, has been made increasingly difficult as house prices continue to soar. If this and previous Governments had listened to us sooner, we might have avoided a housing problem turning into a national emergency. It is a national disgrace that so many of our citizens are currently excluded from the housing market. Increasing house prices effectively put the dream of owning a house out of the reach of most ordinary citizens. It is also proving more and more difficult for people to rent property as the cost of rent has also soared.

These are the sort of crises that cannot be fixed by reliance on the market. It is a shocking fact that this Government and that which preceded it have contributed to the situation by not delivering affordable rental or housing for purchase through affordable schemes. These problems will only be fully resolved if local authorities are given the resources they need to build social and affordable housing. A new scheme was announced almost two years ago as part of budget 2016 and in the last number of days the Government has announced an affordable housing scheme. We are only now seeing the detail of the scheme and it is disappointing to say the least. It lacks focus and clear targets and it offers a new loan scheme that shows this Government is clearly not living in the real world. Would one expect any more from a Government that cannot give a figure for what constitutes an affordable house? This housing crisis is leaving this country with a legacy of a generation that knows nothing other than homelessness and housing insecurity. That is the legacy of this and previous Governments.

Co-operative housing, such as at Ó Cualann in Ballymun, has not been delivered on the required scale but is the only affordable housing in the country. That is a shame. It can be rolled out and the local authorities should be given the role of doing it.

This motion is designed to say to the Government that we need to do an awful lot more in terms of providing affordable housing. Nobody in the Chamber would disagree with that but the problem is that we do not have anything like the action we need.

It galls me to listen to Fianna Fáil Deputies sometimes. Deputy Casey spoke about Fine Gael as the party for the rich and for developers and, while I do not disagree with him, given what has happened recently, Fianna Fáil was previously the party of and for developers. It was the party of the property bubble and the party which lined the pockets of developers, while many Fianna Fáil politicians had their own pockets lined with brown envelopes. We had the Galway tent and when the whole thing went belly up and the economy crashed, we ended up with tens of thousands of families in negative equity, many of whom lost their home. A bit of humility and honesty from Fianna Fáil would not go astray, rather than blaming everybody else for problems they started.

Despite the rhetoric from the Minister, we are putting forward sensible, practical, common-sense, deliverable solutions that can bring about more homes for people and more affordable housing. It requires a move away from market solutions and from putting tens of millions of euro from taxpayers into the pockets of private landlords and speculators, instead putting it into public housing. Until we make the decision to do that, we will be back here, time and again, to have debates and motions on housing. The Government knows where it is going wrong and what needs to be done but the ideological disposition, of both Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael, is not to build public housing, which has been stopped for the past 20 years. Their disposition is to put money into the private sector rather than deliver homes for people. The Minister needs to put his ideology away, stop lining the pockets of private developers and build homes for people who need them.

I thank the Deputies who contributed and Sinn Féin for presenting the opportunity to have an update on the situation with regard to the delivery of social and affordable housing.

Deputy Connolly said no social housing units had been delivered in Galway in recent years. More than 220 were delivered by Galway city and county in the past two years, which is an insufficient number and does not go near to meeting social housing demand but Deputies should at least be accurate when they make comments in the Chamber.

Deputy Mattie McGrath, in a typically colourful contribution, spoke about the role of approved housing bodies and legislation is being drafted at the moment on the role of these bodies. The greater part of the social housing that has been provided in the past few years was by such bodies and their work should be acknowledged and supported.

Deputy Jan O'Sullivan mentioned the vacant sites register, which is being implemented by some local authorities and not by others. My part of the Department deals specifically with local authorities and there is an overzealous application by some local authorities to sites that are clearly not vacant, such as family farm holdings on the edge of urban centres which would not qualify under anyone's definition of a vacant site. Her general point about the lack of action by many local authorities is, however, true and this is an issue with which I will be dealing in the coming months.

I will speak about what the Minister for Housing, Planning and Local Government, Deputy Eoghan Murphy, and the Minister of State at the Department of Housing, Planning, Community and Local Government, Deputy Damien English, both of whom are directly responsible for housing, have been doing in the past couple of weeks. Earlier, the Minister outlined his intentions regarding strategic land management and housing delivery. He plans to co-ordinate a lot of the work through the new residential land management and development group. Land is at the heart of the delivery of housing, particularly affordable housing. If builders pay too much for land it drives up the cost of supply and this is passed on to buyers and renters. If local authorities cannot get their hands on good housing land at fair prices they cannot deliver social and affordable homes.

The Minister will be bringing together key stakeholders from the Department, the Housing Agency, the Housing Finance Agency, the Department of Finance, local authorities and the NDFA. Other relevant semi-State and State bodies will be invited along as appropriate. The group will drive the development of housing on State land, accelerate the delivery of housing from all residentially zoned land and monitor and assess the availability of residential development land. We have commenced preparatory work with officials in the Department and the intention is that the full group will convene in the coming weeks.

We have also mapped 2,000 ha of local authority housing agency and broader State residential lands. We have a build programme of 12,293 social housing homes so there is still significant capacity from that land and local authorities have major sites, some of which were mentioned in the motion. These include O'Devaney Gardens, St. Michael's in Inchicore and the Oscar Traynor Road - all in Dublin City Council 's area. There is also Kilcarbery in Clondalkin, which is in South Dublin County Council; Wellview in Mulhuddart, Fingal; Hampton in Balbriggan, which is a housing agency property; Shanganagh in Dún Laoghaire-Rathdown; and Whitechurch Road in Cork city.

We need homes on these sites as soon as possible. The State also has suitable sites scattered around many of our towns and cities where with a little imagination and a lot of determination, we could deliver many of the new homes we need. At the housing summit, local authorities were asked to think about State-owned sites in their areas that would be strategically important for them in terms of the delivery of housing. I would say that every Deputy in the Chamber could name numerous HSE sites that are dotted around the country in prime locations. Virtually every significant urban centre in the country has such a site. Some will be suitable for housing while some will not be, but we do need to look at those sites in the context of the housing shortage. It does not make sense from a social or economic perspective to have such sites lying idle. Now that the Minister has announced the three affordable housing initiatives - the Rebuilding Ireland loan, the affordable purchase scheme and the affordable rental scheme - local authorities can be more ambitious in their plans for the development of these lands. Local authority chief executives were at the summit. We will meet them and their teams individually to discuss how each local authority will realise new homes from these lands in terms of its updated social housing targets and its plans for the delivery of programme of affordable homes.

What, if anything, is holding up this development? We know that debt is a significant issue on some sites in some local authorities. Are there sites that are not suitable for development in the short to medium term, that is, where there is little or no demand for social or affordable housing? Looking forward, what is the local authority's future requirement for residential lands and how soon will it need to secure additional sites? Is there an opportunity to target broader State land for housing? These are vitally important questions that were raised with chief executives at the summit. We have asked them to come back on this in detail by mid-February at our bilateral meetings.

Under the NPF, we are looking at land in the context of that planning framework. The Government is considering the establishment of a new public development and renewal agency under the planning framework to work with local authorities. It could use State lands or purchase lands in key locations for affordable housing for people to buy or rent, and indeed not just for housing. Such an agency could work with local authorities in assembling and releasing key and strategic areas for renewal and revitalisation and would have access to publicly owned but redundant or under-utilised lands suitable for redevelopment. Such an agency would also help to create a national centre of expertise in development and renewal to ensure that existing lands are utilised to their fullest and best extent and in a manner that complements the sustainable planning and development of our urban and rural areas. It would have a remit beyond housing in terms of providing other vital services in those areas that need regeneration and renewal. The Government will be considering these issues fully in the context of the finalisation of the planning framework.

As part of this broader consideration, the regime available to local authorities to secure new residential land also needs to be examined. We must learn lessons from the recent past. We know that the last time local authorities bought a large amount of lland, some of those sites cost local authorities a lot of money - too much money - and saddled them with large debts. We are working with officials on the examination of the compulsory purchase regime. This is important. Some of the legislation in this area is very old and cumbersome and is not used as often as it could be by local authorities to ensure that vacant and derelict properties in the centre of towns in particular can be compulsorily purchased for housing and indeed other public uses. It is timely given that the Law Reform Commission is now examining the CPO legislation.

In conclusion, the Minister has set out the Government's record on housing. With regard to social housing, we are increasing stock by 50,000 by 2021. A total of €6 billion has been ring fenced. To resuscitate the residential construction sector, we have streamlined planning, provided funding of €200 million in the infrastructure fund and delivered new apartment guidelines, and we are setting up Home Building Finance Ireland. With regard to affordable housing, recognising that people are struggling to meet accommodation costs, we are bringing forward the Rebuilding Ireland home loan, an affordable purchase scheme and an affordable rental scheme. We are not there yet but the signs and data are heading in the right direction for the first time in many years. The latest available housing market data shows that residential construction activity levels continue to strengthen. Planning permissions in the 12 months to the end of September were up 13% year on year. At over 17,500, commencement notices in 2017 were up 33% year on year. Registrations in 2017 were up 68% year on year while at just under 20,000, ESB connections in 2017 were up 29% year on year, which shows that the plan is having an effect. Social housing provision is ahead of target. The Government is committed to delivering on the new affordable housing schemes the Minister and I have mentioned. The Minister and I, along with the Minister of State, Deputy English, the Department and our delivery partners will continue to do all in our power to drive that delivery.

There is a whole swathe of people out there, particularly young people, whose dream of owning a house has been quite literally taken off them. I have a 22-year-old daughter. She told me recently that she does not think she will ever own a home. My husband and I bought a house when I was aged 24. I do not know anyone in the current climate who could even hope to be able to do that, which is a shame and the mark of this Government supported by its very best friends in Fianna Fáil. That is its legacy and that is the Ireland it has created. Through the inability to purchase an affordable home, young and old have been driven into an almost unregulated rental market that gives rights to the landlords and slum lords and takes rights away from tenants. Not only is the dream of owning a house as far away as ever, but they live in fear of rent hikes and eviction at the whim of a landlord. They end up paying sometimes 60% or 70% of their wages in rent. I see these people in my constituency clinics on a weekly basis. They are paying €1,600 to €1,800 for a modest family home and have very little left from their wages at the end of the week to buy essentials never mind save for a deposit. We know that over there on the Fine Gael benches, they think it is as handy as people just tapping up their parents for a few bob but in the real world, it is not like that. Outside here, where real people live, there are people who are literally living hand to mouth. They certainly cannot go to their parents and ask for a few extra bob.

The neoliberal policies of this and successive Governments have meant a continuation of cries in our essential services, including housing. The ongoing issues around the availability of affordable homes for rent and for purchase will not be solved by the Minister's plans announced last week. Under current Government proposals, not one affordable home will be delivered this year. The Minister maintains that the private sector will deliver affordable homes via the local infrastructure housing activation fund but we have yet to see how this will materialise. As Marx said, capital begets capital, which is indeed what the Government is doing. I listened with some humour to the protestations of the Deputies on the Fianna Fáil benches because, of course, while they criticise the Government's policies, it would not be in a position to bring them in were it not for Fianna Fáil's enduring support for its every move. I urge people to support this motion so that we can start to move towards a time when people can realistically afford to buy their own home.

Like, I am sure, every other Deputy, people come to see me every week who are caught in that situation where they do not qualify for local authority housing and mortgages are out of their reach. It is similar to what Deputy O'Reilly said. These are my peers to a large extent. I am 28 and I would say very few of my peers are anywhere near being in a position to buy a house. For those of them who are looking for a house or considering it, the option of going to their mothers and fathers for assistance is not realistic. Many of these people are still paying off their own mortgages. The fact these people do not qualify for local authority housing means they get no assistance with the extortionate rents that exist.

I said in my speech following the last budget that the last two Fine Gael-led Governments have done nothing for people who need that kind of affordable housing model. The first line of this motion absolutely stands: Fine Gael has not delivered a single affordable rental or purchase home through any Government scheme.

In recent weeks, as ever, we have had new announcements from the Department and from the Minister for Housing, Planning and Local Government. However, I am not very optimistic. It is still the case that no such houses have been delivered. The Minister, Deputy Eoghan Murphy, is often quite defensive when he is characterised as being blinded by ideology. He likes to present himself as a practical person driven by solutions and all the rest of it. It is hard to escape the conclusion that there is ideology in this. There is a very rational logical model of local authority-led affordable housing, a model that has not been pursued by the Government with any real vigour. It is clearly the best solution and the best approach. I note that despite the Government first suggesting it in 2014, there has been no movement on a cost-rental model.

I am sceptical of the ability of the affordable housing loan scheme the Government has announced. Perhaps in a functioning housing market it would make a difference and could assist families and it may assist some families. However, on the whole it does not address the real issue that housing is too expensive and beyond the reach of ordinary people. The reality is that for thousands of people, many of them young people, owning a house is a pipe dream and the Government has not addressed that.

I want to respond to the claims of both Ministers that the actions they have been taking are tackling the crisis. We are told the fast-track planning process could deliver up to 10,000 homes. There is no guarantee that a single one of those will be delivered at an affordable price and I suggest they will not. The Minister told us that the local infrastructure housing activation fund will assist affordability. It will not do so on the basis of the figures that we have been able to squeeze out of the Department for the contracts signed so far.

We have been told that the guidelines to reduce the size and quality of apartments and living space will reduce costs. According to I-RES, a unit will reduce by €70,000. Of course, the figure is a fraction of that based on the limited data we have from the Society of Chartered Surveyors Ireland. The Government will make living more difficult for people in high-rise development with no increase in affordability.

Deputy Ó Laoghaire is right about the home loan scheme. That scheme is not a bad idea if there are affordable properties. However, to suggest that the majority of properties purchased in Dublin, Cork and Galway in the last year are less than €320,000 implies that is a benchmark for affordability when it is substantially above it.

With respect to the Part V increase being premature, I would have thought given the difficulties many developers have accessing finance, having an upfront commitment to purchase 20% of the units would actually be financially very attractive to many of them and certainly would assist in implementing Government policy.

It took three years to develop an affordable rental pilot from the plan of the then Minister, Deputy Alan Kelly, in 2014 to 2016 and now the announcement last week. I do not understand how something so relatively straightforward could take so long.

To really understand why many of us believe the Government is not taking affordable housing seriously, I make one simple comparison. The Government is committing €25 million over two years for local authorities to deliver affordable housing. That is compared with the €1.1 billion it is investing in private sector-led schemes through the help-to-buy scheme, the local housing initiative and home building finance Ireland. The vast majority of the investment is in private sector-led schemes that the Minister and his advisers know cannot guarantee the level of affordability that people so desperately need. I urge the Government to redress that balance. The legislation providing for home building finance Ireland needs to prioritise small to medium-sized builders working in conjunction with local authorities and approved housing bodies to build genuinely affordable rental and purchase units on mixed-income and mixed-tenure estates with social housing. It can be done at prices from €170,000 to €250,000 or €260,000, substantially below anything the private sector will deliver in any of the Government's other schemes.

It was interesting that the Minister of State, Deputy Phelan, said he was happy to give us an update. Only one update matters for people desperate for affordable housing, which is how many units the Government has delivered and how many units it will deliver this year. The answer to both of those questions as the Minister of State knows, is zero. In seven years of this Government and the previous Government not a single affordable unit has been delivered through any central government scheme to rent or to buy and not a single unit of such accommodation will be delivered this year. Left to its own devices, the Government will not tackle that problem. We need a major mobilisation of public anger and public demonstration directed towards the Government's failure. On 7 April here in Dublin people from the length and breadth of the country will have the opportunity to express their disappointment in the Government's failure and to demand that it start to invest in genuinely affordable housing for the families who so desperately need it.

Amendment put.

In accordance with Standing Order 70(2), the division is postponed until the weekly division time on Thursday, 1 February 2018.

The Dáil adjourned at 10 p.m. until 10.30 a.m. on Wednesday, 31 January 2018.
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