Rory Hearne
Dublin North-West · Social Democrats · Ireland
“I thank you, a Leas Cheann-Comhairle, for your work and support during the year and thank all the staff here. I wish my colleagues in government the best of luck over the summer and respite from our robust engagement. We look forward to going at it again in the autumn.”
“The Dublin public will be very upset when they realise their fire fighters and emergency response service are at risk of being split and downgraded.”
“I thank the Labour Party for bringing forward this motion. It is important to have a discussion about the context of education costs and back-to-school costs. Of course, the context is massive inequality in this country.”
“However, what it is actually doing is throwing families into even more stress on top of not being able to pay the basic bills. In my constituency to respond and support families struggling with back-to-school costs, the Finglas voluntary food and family support service, Feed Our Homeless, last year organised help for families with a pop-u…”
“A second tier of child benefit would lift 55,000 children out of poverty but the Government will not do it. It costs the same as what it has given in tax breaks to developers, investor funds and large fast-food giants. Childhoods pass quickly. No child should have their future limited by poverty.”
“The Government is ramming through planning legislation this week that will exempt sheds out the back without proper scrutiny. It is satisfied with handing our young people to vulture landlords. The Government is now offering a future of renting a shed out the back with no rights whatsoever.”
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“Last Friday, figures showed that we have reached the highest level of homelessness in this State's history. We also have the highest number of evictions in this country since the Famine. There are 2,500 children who have been in emergency accommodation for longer than one year. The Taoiseach knows that has a devastating impact on children. Many are in my constituency, Dublin North-West. One mother, Shauna, has been in touch with me. She has four children aged 13, seven, three and one. She is an emergency accommodation and is absolutely desperate. The Taoiseach's new rental measures do not protect existing renters from evictions. Will he put in place an emergency ban on no-fault evictions into homelessness?”
“The reason it is not doing that is, as all of the previous Ministers and taoisigh have said, that will scare off landlords. The Government is saying it straight. It is allowing people to be made homeless to protect landlords. It is a disgraceful decision. The Minister is being disingenuous by saying he is going to stand up to this. If he wants to stand up to it, he should put in place a ban on no-fault evictions.”
“I have been telling him since he was appointed that these evictions are happening. He has not raised a peep about them. He has done nothing to protect people from eviction. He has given new tenancies protection but not the 250,000 households who are all facing eviction. There are going to be, and are, hundreds of people across the country who are in situations like those in the Wexford estates and who are being evicted. Some 20,000 households were evicted last year. Thousands are facing eviction notices right now. Why does the Minister not put in place a ban on no-fault evictions? He says it will deter landlords. That is the only reason he is not doing it. Why is the Government not putting in place a ban on evictions and families being made homeless?”
“The Government incentivises investor funds. It thinks they are going to build in Dublin. It wants them to build high-end properties. They are not going to be building anything in the Gaeltachtaí. What has the Government done? It has allowed the landlords in the Gaeltachtaí and in rural Ireland to hike up the rents, which is what they are going to do. It has incentivised landlords to buy up more properties because the rents will be even higher. That puts more pressure on local house prices. The State must intervene in a way that finances local authorities properly, because they do not have sufficient money, to build public affordable housing in our Gaeltachtaí. I will call out the Minister. He threw up his hands and said he is disgraced at what happened with the evictions in Wexford.”
“I again highlight the Government's U-turn and failure to act on short-term lets, which is essentially abandoning the Gaeltachtaí to their homes being purchased continuously for short-term lets and as holiday homes. It is a free market down there. The Government could have done something that would have ensured the homes that are being built and exist are there for people to live in permanently to support our cainteoirí agus ár gcuid pobal Gaeltachta . Tá daoine óga ag fágáil na nGaeltachtaí mar gheall ar easpa tithíochta le ceannach nó le glacadh ar cíos. Young people are leaving the Gaeltacht, just like they are leaving this country, because there is a lack of housing to buy or rent. There is a fundamental flaw within the Government's housing policies, which is the over-reliance on the private market.”
“If we go to any area of the Gaeltacht, there are only a handful of homes available ar cíos fadtéarmach, for long-term rent, and all of it is on Airbnb. Caithfidh an Stát tithe inacmhainne a mhaoiniú agus a thógáil. In my view, the State must finance and build homes trí thacaíocht a thabhairt d’Údarás na Gaeltachta, na húdaráis áitiúla agus pobail áitiúla. That needs to be done through supporting Údarás na Gaeltachta, our local governments and local communities. Le teacht ar réiteach na faidhbe, ní mór do pholasaí teacht le riachtanais mhuintir na háite. Policy has to work for the needs of local people in our Gaeltachtaí. Currently, it is not working. It is actually working against them.”
“This is the fundamental problem and why there is a specific crisis in the Gaeltachtaí. They face a concentration of Airbnb properties and holiday homes that nowhere else in the country is facing. This is a problem that the Government has done a U-turn on and it is absolutely shameful. The Government promised to address the issue of short-term lets and Airbnb but it did a U-turn for its Minister of State, Deputy Michael Healy-Rae. It is back to parish-pump politics. The price that Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael paid to stay in power was to turn their backs on the communities in the Gaeltachtaí who have been highlighting for many years the issues of Airbnb and holiday homes and how they are putting the future of our teanga and their communities, a bpobail, i mbaol.”
“Gabhaim buíochas le Sinn Féin as an tairiscint thábhachtach seo a chur chun cinn. Tá géarchéim tithíochta ar fud na tíre. Tá éigeandáil ann. There is a housing crisis all over this country. It is an emergency. Is fadhb ar leith í sa Ghaeltacht . There is a specific crisis that affects the Gaeltacht. That is, of course, because tá todhchaí na nGaeltachtaí i mbaol agus, mar sin, tá todhchaí na Gaeilge, ár dteanga, i mbaol. There is a specific issue because the future of the Gaeltacht is in danger and that means the future of our language is in danger. Tá todhchaí na nGaeltachtaí i mbaol mar níl aon tithe ar fáil le ceannach nó le glacadh ar cíos. There is nothing to buy or rent for the cainteoirí, the Irish speakers, in the Gaeltacht, because all the properties are on Airbnb or are tithe saoire, holiday homes.”
“Roimh olltoghchán 2024, gheall na Daonlathaithe Sóisialta go gcruthófaí beartas náisiúnta do phleanáil tithíochta agus forbairt i gceantair Ghaeltachta agus cumhachtaí soiléire a thabhairt d'Údarás na Gaeltachta maidir le tithíocht. Tá aitheantas ón Roinn tithíochta ag teastáil ó Údarás na Gaeltachta ionas gur féidir leis iarratas a dhéanamh ar airgead faoin scéim ready to build. Ansin, is féidir leis na seirbhísí riachtanacha a sholáthar ar thalamh atá ina sheilbh aige nó a cheannaíonn sé. Ansin, is féidir leis an údarás suímh a dhíol faoi théarmaí na scéime ready to build le teaghlaigh a labhraíonn Gaeilge ar mhian leo maireachtáil i gceantair Ghaeltachta. Tá na freagraí ar na fadhbanna ar eolas cheana féin. Ní cóir dúinn a thuilleadh ama a chur amú.”
“Tá géarchéim tithíochta na gceantar Gaeltachta ag cur todhchaí na Gaeilge mar theanga bheo i mbaol. Nuair a d'fhéach mé an mhí seo caite, bhí deich dteach le fáil ar cíos i gConamara ar Daft.ie agus bhí 573 ar fáil ar Airbnb. Tá iallach á chur ar dhaoine óga imeacht. De réir the 1 million homes project, tá gá le 12,000 teach i gceantair Ghaeltachta. Sa chlár Rialtais, tá gealltanas go n-oibreofar le hÚdarás na Gaeltachta "chun a chinntiú go bhfuil dóthain seirbhísí tithíochta agus seirbhísí pobail ar fáil i bpobail Ghaeltachta." Faoi na dlíthe reatha, is féidir le hÚdarás na Gaeltachta infreastruchtúr a fhorbairt, dul i mbun forbairt eacnamaíochta agus seirbhísí a sholáthar thar ceann comhlachtaí Stáit eile sa Ghaeltacht.”
“I gceann cúpla mí, beidh Míde Nic Fhionnlaoich ina hionadaí orainn i bhfothoghchán Ghaillimh Thiar. Is as Gaeltacht Chonamara ó dhúchas í. Beidh sí ina guth láidir dá pobal agus tá a fhios ag Dia go bhfuil ceann de dhíth orthu. Tá faillí eacnamaíochta á déanamh ar na ceantair Ghaeltacht den chuid is mó. Is existential threat don teanga iad na fadhbanna atá roimh na ceantair seo. Aithnímid go bhfuil cónaí ar chainteoirí Gaeilge i gcathracha agus fud fad na tíre ach ní mór aird ar leith a thabhairt ar cheantair Ghaeltachta. Gan ceantair Ghaeltachta agus gan áiteanna ina n-úsáidtear an Ghaeilge mar chuid den saol laethúil, níl aon todhchaí ag an teanga. Ní hé ganntanas post an t-aon fhadhb. Fiú dá mbeadh poist ann do chainteoirí dúchais Gaeilge, an mbeadh siad in ann tithe a fháil?”
“Tá ríméad orm an deis seo a fháil chun labhairt ar Sheachtain na Gaeilge. Nílim líofa ach, cosúil lena lán daoine, táim ag déanamh iarracht mhór chun an Ghaeilge a fhoghlaim arís mar tá Gaeilge i mo chroí. Tá ár dteanga dhúchais ag fás arís. Tá sé istigh i gcroíthe a lán daoine ar fud na tíre. Tá a lán daoine ag déanamh iarracht mhór leis an nGaeilge sa tseachtain seo. Tá sé tábhachtach dom dul lasmuigh de mo comfort zone ó am go ham, faoi mar atáim ag déanamh anois. Tá dúthracht ag mo pháirtí, na Daonlathaithe Sóisialta, an teanga náisiúnta a fhorbairt, a chosaint agus a athbheochan. Tugaimid aird ar leith ar réigiúin agus pobail Ghaeltachta. Tacóimid leo go praiticiúil, go háirithe de bharr go bhfuil go leor acu faoi mhíbhuntáiste socheacnamaíochta riamh anall.”
“Why will the Minister of State not take it? Do the institutional investors, the corporate landlords and the landlord lobby have the Minister of State so under their thumb that he will not act for the thousands of individuals, children and families who are being made homeless?”
“Fundamentally, it goes back to the Government's failure to prioritise homelessness and prevention. The Government cut the tenant in situ scheme and will not increase the HAP limits. What does it do? It increases the rents chargeable for investor funds. The Simon Community's report showed there are no rental properties within the HAP limits for those who are being made homeless, so where are they supposed to go to? The new rental increases will lead to higher rents and higher levels of homelessness. Yet, the Government says it is all needed for supply because supply and more supply is the solution. Supply is not the solution for families and children whose landlords are evicting them. The solution is a ban on evictions of families and children into homelessness. That is an immediate emergency action that the Minister of State could take.”
“The Minister for housing should be here to answer this but he is not. He runs away from it. He runs away from his responsibility. There are 1,100 children in emergency accommodation for longer than two years. We know some of them have been in that accommodation for three, four or five years. There has been a 25% increase in the past year. This State is absolutely responsible for that. It is a derogation of that responsibility to allow this to continue. I can guarantee there will be commissions of inquiry in the future as to how this State let this happen. The Government knows it and has known it for years. It is a shame on Fianna Fáil, Fine Gael and this Government that thousands of children are being left in emergency accommodation that is deeply damaging.”
“That is one year of not being able to have birthday parties, not being able to have friends over and living in unsuitable accommodation. Barnardos and the Royal College of Physicians have set it out. The evidence is there. Yesterday, the Taoiseach gave a State apology for people being institutionalised. We are institutionalising a generation of children. This State, the Government, Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael are institutionalising thousands of children right now under their watch. The Government knows it is happening. It knows the damage it is doing to children. Yet, what does the Government do? It wrings its hands, shrugs its shoulders and says we cannot put a ban on evictions. That would be emergency action that would prevent children being made homeless but the Government will not do it.”
“The Government's new rental measures do nothing to protect the hundreds of thousands of renters who are in existing tenancies and will still be subject to no-fault evictions, so we will continue to see thousands of children in this country subject to trauma - trauma that is utterly preventable. It is preventable if the Government has the courage to put in place a ban on evictions but it will not do it. The Government will take emergency action for investor funds but it will not do it for thousands of children and families who have been made homeless, are homeless or will become homeless in the coming months and years. I will go through some of those figures. There are now 2,500 children who, right now, have spent over one year in emergency accommodation.”
“This event can be extremely traumatic for children and unfortunately, without supports, long lasting. The trauma can affect children’s relationships with others, their behaviour and ability to engage in school, their confidence levels and feeling of wellbeing, in essence all aspects of their lives. This State is failing 5,188 children who are in emergency accommodation right now, the thousands of children who have been through emergency accommodation and the thousands of children who will become homeless in the coming years because the Government failed to put a ban on evictions of children and families who will be made homeless.”
“Before I get onto that report, a Royal College of Physicians study in 2019 showed that 40% of children in emergency accommodation were experiencing clinically significant levels of mental health and behavioural difficulties. That figure is 40% - almost half of the children in emergency accommodation. Children in homelessness were twice as likely to require hospitalisation as children not living in homelessness. The Barnardos report states: It is hard to understate the potential impact that moving into emergency accommodation can have on a child. For many children we work with, it is a case of suddenly leaving their homes, most of their belongings, potentially their pets, and moving into much smaller accommodation that is less suitable and a considerable distance from their previous homes.”
“I estimate somewhere in the region of 40,000 children have been through emergency accommodation in ten years of Fine Gael being in government. I still do not understand how Fine Gael and the Government just say this is okay, this is normal and they actually treat it like the emergency it is. The Government is not treating it like the emergency it is. It is an absolute scandal. I am going to read some of a report from Barnardos which it released last year. It is about the impact of homelessness on children. I encourage people to read it and try to highlight it as much as possible because it is devastating. What is being done to children in emergency accommodation and the utter failure of this State to provide for those children is devastating.”
“That is an almost 20% increase in the number of families who are homeless and this Government acts as if its housing policy is working. Since the Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael Government was set up just over a year ago, we have seen the number of children who are homeless increase by 11%. Let us look at Fine Gael's record in government. We have figures from 2014. That is 12 years of Fine Gael in government and there has been a 590% increase in the number of children who are homeless in this country. How many children have gone through emergency accommodation over that decade? We do not actually have figures for that. I am the only one who has tried to estimate how many children have been in emergency accommodation over the past decade.”
“However, not once does the Minister of State say the levels of homelessness are too high. What are the levels? There were 16,734 individuals homeless in December. The Government goes on about the success of housing policy and, reading this statement, you would think the Government is absolutely solving the issue of homelessness. What is the reality? The figures are there in the local authority quarterly report, which I have gone through. I will show the Minister of State the figures and the reality of homelessness which the Minister of State and the Government completely deny and are trying to normalise. There has been a 12% increase in the past 12 months. There are now 2,478 families homeless in this country, an 18.5% increase since the start of last year.”
“I am not taking aim at the Minister of State but it is deeply disappointing that the Minister responsible, Deputy James Browne, is not in the Chamber for this. These are the first statements on homelessness under his Ministry. We are told he is at a subcommittee. Surely, that subcommittee could have been rearranged and he could have had the decency to be here. I am not taking it out on the Minister of State but it is absolutely disgraceful that the Minister for housing is not here for the first statements on homelessness. Reading through the Minister of State's statement, I can call it nothing other than sanitised spin to deflect from utter failure. The Minister of State accepts the profound impact homelessness has on individuals and particularly children. That is one sentence in a three-page statement.”
“It is not working for SNAs, it is not working for children, it is not working for teachers and it is not working for parents. The Taoiseach states that there has been a huge increase in numbers, but the reality is that there is a need for this increase in order to make real inclusion in our classes work to support both children and the SNAs and teachers who are doing their best.”
“Clearly, a change is needed in order to reflect the valuable work SNAs do so that they can provide the supports that are needed to children. There is a better way forward. The review of the review is not good enough. We need to see the role of SNAs recognised properly and expanded to include regulation and communication. SNAs across the country, including those in my constituency, assist children with regulation, which is not mentioned in the 2014 circular, and communication, but this is not considered when allocating SNAs. The Minister must agree to an open and honest conversation with parents, unions, advocacy groups and school leaders, who we will see outside the Dáil later and who are rightly raising their voices because what they are doing is expressing that the system is not working for them.”
“The shambles we have seen over the past few weeks would suggest that either the Government does not adequately understand the crisis it is overseeing or the real meaning of inclusion for our children. The decision to cut the number of SNAs was a decision to cut, regardless of how the Government wants to spin it. It was a reduction and a curtailment of the duties on which an assessment would take place on the basis of a highly outdated circular. Nearly one third of the schools that were reviewed were told that the number of SNAs would be reduced. This was a cut. These reviews are clearly not fit for purpose. The question must be asked as to whether the NCSE is the appropriate body to carry out these assessments.”
“Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael do not wait around to remove rent controls, which will push thousands of renters into poverty, but when it comes to delivering public healthcare that would give real help to working families, they delay year after year. I will give a sense of that cost of GP care for families. I have a six-, a ten- and a 12-year-old. Before Christmas, my ten-year-old son had bad asthma. We had to go to the doctor a few times. My 12-year-old got a virus around the same time. Between doctors' visits, prescriptions, the multiple bottles of Calpol and Nurofen that parents know well, it cost me upwards of €350 within two weeks. Most families cannot afford that. We need genuine public, affordable healthcare.”
“The workload for GPs is higher in disadvantaged communities, with patients presenting with more complex needs and developing chronic diseases much younger, yet our public health system does not reflect that. We need the changes put forward today in that regard. In 2019, the them Minister for Health, Simon Harris, committed to extend free GP care to children under 12. "We are extending free GP care to children under 12 years but on a phased and careful basis," he said. That was seven years ago. There is still no sign of it. Most people's understanding of a phased introduction is a year or two, not seven years. Contrast that with the way in which Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael have rammed through billions in VAT cuts to developers overnight.”
“In my constituency, in areas like Ballymun and Finglas, which are some of the most deprived areas in the country, they do not have access to GP care, in particular in the area of Finglas west and south, which, as I said, has some of the highest levels of deprivation and poverty in this State, with a population of upwards of 20,000 and not one GP. GP Care For All has been trying to set up there. We are still waiting on support from the HSE and the Minister on that, and I hope the Minister of State, Deputy Murnane O'Connor, will come back on that. In other parts of the constituency, in Whitehall and Beaumont, we have an ageing population with complex care needs and, again, inadequate access to GP care.”
“I thank my colleague Deputy Rice for bringing this motion forward. It is a really important motion and is core to the Social Democrats. Why we are here and what we are about is ensuring that people have access to universal public healthcare as a human right and as a public service, regardless of where they are from and regardless of their income, that they have access to that most basic and fundamental need. Is ceart daonna í an tsláinte. Ba chóir go mbeadh rochtain ar sheirbhísí ardchaighdeáin phoiblí, an tsláinte san áireamh, ag gach duine. Caithfidh an iomarca daoine íoc go príobháideach as cóireáil, áfach. Unfortunately, too many people have to pay to access healthcare in this country.”
“They are stuck in traffic and cannot provide care for their children and disabled people. This affects so many people and our Gaeltachtaí. It is not working, and remote working can play a fundamental role in ensuring people have more balanced and more sustainable lives rather than tearing themselves apart, commuting for hours and struggling to get back to children. We need remote work to be supported properly.”
“It is called No One Shouted Stop - Until Now: The GAA’s Response to Ireland’s Demographic Shift. Bills like this and the one my party colleague Deputy Gibney is bringing forward are telling us to yell "stop". We need to support villages, towns and communities in order to ensure their survival. This is a golden opportunity. Remote work is a golden opportunity to allow people to live in communities, inár mbailte, inár sráidbhailte, ar na hoileáin agus inár nGaeltachtaí. Rural GAA teams are fighting for their lives - ag troid ar son a saoil – agus nach cuid den réiteach é tithíocht inacmhainne freisin? They are all interconnected - affordable housing, public transport and remote working. They need to work together. Ireland is not working for so many people who are going out to work.”
“There needs to be a massive change in the approach to remote work in legislation to formalise it as a legitimate labour entitlement and a right and to ensure that remote working is harnessed to support people and communities. Ireland needs a national target for remote work. We need to facilitate and support companies to support workers to ensure that the right and access to remote employment is available for workers across this country. We should not be reverting to them versus us, as has been referred to. This is about making Ireland work for people and making it work for communities across the country. Officials from the GAA recently appeared before the housing committee and presented their report about the future of the organisation and rural depopulation.”
“It takes too long to set up funding", but what does not take long is to jack up the rents for the institutional investors. No, he can do that overnight. What did not take long was guaranteeing the banks and bailing them out in 2008 and throwing this entire society under a bus. That could be done overnight but when it comes to emergency measures to ban families from being made homeless, the Government cannot do that. When it comes to a State construction company, it is a bit complicated, it takes a bit of time and is a bit of a risk. A savings scheme that could funnel billions of euro into affordable housing takes too long and the Government is not able to do that. Of course, it is only interested in certain solutions; the ones that keep the market going. That is where its housing plans are creating continual misery and will not work.”
“We have come forward with multiple solutions. We outlined the State savings scheme, for example, a year ago. Where is it? There has been literally nothing moved on it. There is €166 billion sitting there and the Tánaiste is basically going to hand it over to financial markets for people to roll the dice in the casino of the stock market and see if they will make their money instead of using it to guarantee a return to them risk-free. The State would guarantee it and the Minister could build tens of thousands of affordable homes but his boss, the Taoiseach, says, "Cannot do that, it takes too long." Of course it takes too long if you sit on your hands and do not do it. The Minister will be back next year saying, "You have no solutions. It takes too long to set up a State construction company.”
“They pointed out that one fifth of the housing in countries such Norway, Sweden and Denmark is different forms of community-led, co-operative housing, which really works to counterbalance the market. For the past 20 years in Ireland, how many community-led, affordable, co-operative-type homes have we built? It has been 150, through Ó Cualann. Indeed, I tabled a parliamentary question directly to the Minister on what Government's policy on co-operative and community-led housing was and he replied that there is no policy. That sums it all up really. We have a potential model to deliver genuinely affordable, community-led housing and what has Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael done with it? Absolutely nothing. It is not even in the Minister's housing plan. He says the Opposition does not come forward with solutions.”
“Leitrim had none, Kilkenny had none, Louth had 26, Meath had six and Monaghan had none. We can go through it county after county. The Government has seriously said, "We will deliver affordable purchase homes on a major scale through local authorities." No, it has not. I was at a housing committee meeting earlier. I do not know whether the Minister or his advisers were turned into it but it was frustrating and strangely inspiring. We had presentations from representatives of the community land trust organisations and community housing organisations, such as Ó Cualann and others, who discussed the potential for community and co-operative affordable housing.”
“What do we see from Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael? Absolutely pathetic delivery of affordable housing. In 2024, for example, the total local authority affordable purchase houses delivered was 772. Dublin City Council, in my own constituency, delivered 12 local authority affordable purchase homes.; Donegal County Council, not one; Galway City Council, not one; Kerry County Council, not one; Kildare County Council, not one; Offaly, Roscommon and Sligo county councils, not one. I only have the figures for the first three quarters of 2025. Dublin City Council went from 12 to none. Donegal County Council still did not deliver one affordable home. Deputy Doherty is lacking in affordable housing there. Similarly, Galway City Council provided eight affordable purchase homes.”
“Regarding affordable housing, and I remember highlighting this for several years, the other thing that happens when policy is driven by ensuring housing is viable, which is essentially profitable to the market, the market being institutional investors in this case, the Government fails to prioritise other policies. Affordable housing is key and institutional investors made it very clear for several years that they do not want to see a significant delivery of affordable housing in this country. Why do they not want to see it? What was the biggest risk they identified? Institutional investors identified very clearly that the biggest risk to their model is an alternative such as affordable housing where people do not have to pay these rents. If people had a choice, would they pay the rents? They absolutely would not.”
“In Finland and Denmark, it is just 4% and in Sweden, it is just 8% because these Nordic social democracies treat housing as a social good. The Government has a fundamental problem. It is building its housing policy around treating housing as an investment asset for global financial funds. There is a contradiction at the heart of its housing policy. It cannot be a public good, a social good, a human right on the one hand, and an asset that is essentially there to be sweated on the other. There is a problem, as the Minister has seen, at what point they get enough. They never get enough. This is why we have to treat housing as a human right. We will bring forward a Bill to treat housing as a human right, which the Government has failed to do and is at the core of the failure of its housing policies.”
“The Minister does not realise it because he is deluding himself about a policy that is about allowing rents rise for renters-tenants. These are the people who fought for and founded this State. The Minister is allowing institutional investors to essentially charge whatever rent they want to people and force them to pay. It is absolutely incredible that he is doing this and I am convinced he is completely captured by them. He does not even accept basic economic arguments as to why it is completely ludicrous to allow rents rise for a supply of housing that will never bring down rents unless we have an economic crash. Under Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael, home ownership among younger generations has collapsed. Some 40% of adults aged 25 to 34, or over half a million, are still living with their parents.”
“As I have called them previously, they are vampire funds. They are not only vulture funds. Vultures come in, eat the carcasses and hang around for a bit, which the former Minister, Michael Noonan, spoke about. However, what vampire funds are here for is to keep sucking the blood from generation after generation, extracting the rent from them. The Minister is part of facilitating generations in this country who will have their lives destroyed struggling to pay rent to foreign institutional funds. He has turned the nature of our housing market on its head from when Fianna Fáil was supposedly the party standing up for the homeowner, for the middle people and for people to be able to buy their property. Fianna Fáil has turned it on its head and it does not realise how captured it has become.”
“The Minister might be familiar with the economic concept of oligopolies, which are, essentially, where markets can be controlled by a small number of players. In some parts of Dublin, we know this goes as high as 50%. The problem is not only the purchasing of homes; it is then what they are doing with that bulk purchase. It is controlling the market to set the very market rents. The Minister has changed the policy to allow them to do so. They can control the market and set the rent. Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael have utterly transformed our housing system in a detrimental way by rolling out the red carpet for institutional investors and by allowing them to continue to buy up properties. They see no problem with it. They are blinded to the negative downsides of this and the problem. These funds are not here to build affordable housing.”
“The reason is the Minister's housing policy has been completely based on institutional investors. I say the Minister's policy but I include Fine Gael in that because there is no real difference between Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael. Effectively, they are the same party who are completely in bed with the institutional investors. The rental measures the Minister introduced last week were the epitome of turning his back on ordinary people in this country in favour of large corporate investors. The Minister said there is no real concern about this issue of institutional investors and asked what our concern is about this. Does the Minister know how many private rental homes are now owned by institutional landlords in Dublin? Over one in five of all rental properties in Dublin is now owned by big corporate landlords. Why is that a problem?”
“They were fundamentally flawed from the outset because a huge part of our housing system is being excluded from the measures the Minister is claiming are there to restrict the bulk purchase of homes. Indeed, the guidelines set it out very clearly. When the measures designed to prohibit the bulk buying of houses and duplexes were introduced in 2021, the Department of housing guidelines stated that apartments were not included in this measure. The Minister talks about homes. He is not talking about homes but is only talking about one part of the housing market. Apartments, which are the main type of housing being built in my constituency, across Dublin, in Cork and increasingly in other parts of country, are completely excluded from this, so we have the ongoing bulk purchase of apartments by institutional investors.”
“It is very disappointing to again see the Minister's failure to support a measure which could help the housing crisis. I thank Sinn Féin and Deputy Doherty for bringing forward the motion. Unfortunately, it is one of many areas where we are seeing the Government claiming that its policies are being developed to promote affordable housing and to promote delivery of housing but, in fact, they are, what I think describes it very accurately, "designed to fail". The Minister had no interest in banning or stopping institutional investors from buying up properties, or buying up what they actually are, namely, homes, because when they were introduced, the measures to restrict the bulk purchase of homes did not apply to apartments, and it is in the countermotion.”
“Next month will mark three years since the publication of the Shannon report into sexual abuse of children at St. John Ambulance. Despite the passage of so much time, we are still waiting for recommendations to be implemented. Now there are question marks about the independence of a national safeguarding officer. I am told that survivors have been trying to meet the Minister but they have been refused a meeting. This foot dragging and refusal to engage in such an important issue is unacceptable. We need a debate on this issue this week.”
“Tá an ghéarchéim thithíochta uafásach. Today, it has been revealed by the Simon Communities Locked Out of the Market report that there are zero properties available within standard housing assistance payment, HAP, limits. This is the first time any Simon Communities report has shown there is not one property available. Where are people to go and how are they supposed to afford the extortionate market rents? It is an emergency, but the only emergency action the Government is taking is to allow landlords to hike up rents. In my constituency, I have people coming to me all the time who cannot afford the rent and are stuck in homelessness. We saw emergency action during Covid. We saw the eviction ban and short-term lets being used to house people. Will the Tánaiste take emergency action?”
“We will take these measures." The Government is introducing a Bill that still very much does not addressing fundamental causes of our housing and homelessness crisis. We will continue to see it. Instead, the Government is going to make it much worse with higher rents.”
“Yet the Minister could do it. He could accept this amendment. It is so frustrating to be here knowing that he could do something that would prevent homelessness, but he will not do it. It is a disgrace. It makes hollow all these claims he has made that he cares about homelessness, and he is treating it as an emergency. No, he is not. To treat it as an emergency would be to implement a no-fault eviction ban across the board. He said that landlords will flee and more landlords will sell up. If there was a no-fault eviction ban and a landlord did sell up, the family or individual would still be there. They could sell their property as they do in other countries, such as Belgium. Why will the Minister not do that? It is because he will not step up and state, "We believe housing is a human right. This is an emergency.”