Should Ireland focus more on its housing crisis?
Under the last government’s tenure homelessness, house prices and rents surged. Ahead of the country’s general election, experts claimed candidates must tighten up housing policies if they stand any hope of reforming problems.
At the beginning of this month Prime Minister Simon Harris announced a snap election in Ireland for Friday 29th November. He did so in a bid to extend his Fine Gael party’s record 14-year run in power.
However, if the latest housing statistics are anything to go by, 2024 could be the year their rival party, Fianna Fáil reach victory.
September 2024 is the last month for which housing figures in the country are available and it’s safe to say they are nothing to brag about. In fact, it’s the complete opposite. Data from Cork Simon – a leading homelessness prevention charity – shows that there were 14,760 people in emergency accommodation – this figure included 4,561 children from 2,133 families.
Sadly, the blows don’t stop there. The report from Cork Simon highlights the majority of people recorded as homeless were found to be based in Dublin with the next highest number outlined to be in Cork – 549 adults were found to be in emergency accommodation. What’s more, 183 children in the Southwest region, comprising both Cork and Kerry, were said to be homeless.
When announcing the data, Housing Minister Darragh O’Brien said: ‘Ultimately, increased housing supply will be the solution to this challenge.
‘As we wait for this supply to take hold, supporting individuals and families facing homelessness will remain a top priority for this government.’
In theory delivering more homes should combat the problem, but the latest government’s struggle to frequently hit housing targets shows this solution may not be the best. Rents in the country have been increasing for 15 consecutive quarters as demand for housing has consistently outstripped supply.
Alan Barrett, Director of the Economic and Social Research Institute (ESRI), has remarked that historic underinvestment is to blame for the shortage of housing supply.
He claimed that the aftermath of the country’s financial crisis in the late 2000s public investment was ‘cut back severely for a prolonged period of time’. Though after the economy began to recover and the population started to grow from 2010 there was a widening infrastructure deficit.
Mr Bennett said: ‘Our difficulty at the moment is we’ve got lots of money to spend on infrastructure investment, we just don’t have the construction workers to deliver it.’
Next steps
Mr Pat Sheehan, a Sinn Fein politician and former Provisional Irish Republican Army member, said a referendum on a right to housing was needed as soon as possible in addition to a dedicated role in government for homelessness.
‘It would act as a driving force for the policy changes that are necessary to tackle homelessness,’ Mr Sheehan said. ‘The next government [also] have a minister of state with responsibility for homelessness, with the necessary powers to drive and implement cross-departmental action to tackle homelessness.’
Another key aspect, one which is being promised across the board by political parties, to tackling the ongoing housing crisis is by providing a significant increase in the delivery of social homes. Mr Sheehan claimed rents within the private sector are getting so high that a lot of families can’t afford to pay them, meaning social housing would be a much more affordable option.
‘It is an opportunity to underpin social cohesion, economic development and secure a better future for every man, woman and child in the State,’ Mr Sheehan said. ‘We believe we deserve nothing less.’
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