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Housing For Some


This week Fianna Fáil Housing Minister Darragh O'Brien launched the Government's new housing strategy, entitled 'Housing For All'. Though the name is quite deceiving, as it does not in fact plan for 'Housing For All'.

In what feels like the 1,237th housing document released since Fine Gael took office in 2011, and ten years later are still in power, it once again lacks ambition, and puts more focus on subsidising landlords and investment funds, rather than deliver family homes.

It seems like just yesterday that former Housing Minsters Jan O'Sullivan, Alan Kelly, and Eoghan Murphy, were massaging figures to give the illusion that homes were being delivered, when in fact landlords were given an incentive to drive up rents through schemes such as the Housing Assistance Payment, HAP. This scheme was used to divert the figures of people awaiting public homes, making it appear that there were less people in need of permanent housing than there actually were, and still are.

And Minister O'Brien is no different, apart from the fact that he's the first of five not to annouce the opening of the Lord Edward Street in Limerick City, which saw a near annual announcement from various housing ministers.

Under this 'new' plan, half of these 'new' homes will be privately owned and rented. The private sector isn't at fault here in Ireland, it's the mismanagement of the public housing system that has caused a knock-on effect in the private housing market.

Across Ireland so-called 'affordable homes', are being sold or rented out, generating a small fortune for the investor, at the expense of the tax-payer. This practice looks set to continue for the forseeable future, with the focus of this housing plan being the private sector rather than prospective homeowners.

The strain on the public housing market will not be met by this plan, with roughly a quarter of homes due to come under local authority control, that is unless public housing is also handed over to the private sector.

Very little has differed in this plan from the previous government plans, except that it is yet to fail to substantially miss its own mediocre targets. I hope that I am proven wrong, as along with healthcare this is one of the greatest crises to blight this country.

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