Bríd Smith urges eviction ban extension to stop homelessness

Goehrmāgat, Lās Cian Ghorle, Minister. Yesterday you told us that you have not yet decided what to do regarding extending the present partial eviction ban. Apparently you say it is complicated, the Attorney-General has to be consulted, there are legal opinions that have to be sought, and balance must be struck, a balance between the rights of landlords and the rights of tenants. The real solution, again, you told us is supply. Let me help you. Like every TD in this House, your Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael colleagues in my clinic is out the door with housing issues, with people in inadequate living spaces, on sofas, in places infested with mould and damp, in rented rooms costing £1,500 to £2,000 a month plus. But the anger and desperation and the fear of these regular and now perfectly normal housing cases is nothing, compared to the terror of those facing eviction. Absolute terror. You have to extend the eviction ban. To simplify it for you, we are talking here about stopping children, children being made homeless. Focus Ireland have said that the ban is stemming and not stopping, but stemming the tide of families into homelessness. They have said that the bans during COVID in particular contributed to significant falls in homeless figures. You have failed to deal with this crisis of supply, as you call it. You have failed, as your predecessors have failed, to provide the house's need. But if you fail to announce soon this wholly inadequate ban and extend it, you will be saying to those facing eviction that it is OK for this state to oversee terror, inflicted on the most vulnerable and to literally put thousands of families and single people out of their homes. They will face evictions into utter chaos with literally no homes for rent, particularly if they are reliant on HAP or other supports. This House cannot stand over such callous disregard. We are often lectured about the unintended consequences of badly drawn up legislation. But let us be clear, the intended consequence of not accepting this bill or producing your own legislation is to inflict terror and homelessness on thousands and thousands of people. Yes, the eviction ban is not a solution to the crisis, we all know that, but it is not intended to be. It is intended only to buy time in the hope that real measures to provide homes for all people can be implemented. I will come to that at the end. I am going to save you some time because I expected yesterday that we will hear a litany of the great plans and schemes that you are busy devising and implementing. I will save you time and list out the various plans that you intend to sing the praises of. First of all, we have the First Home Affordable Purchase Scheme, the Shared Equity Scheme, the Help to Buy Initiative, the Cost Rental Housing Scheme, the Vacant Homes Action Plan, the Vacant Properties Refurbishment Grant, the Urban Regeneration Development Fund. We also have the Buy and Renew Scheme, the Repair and Lease Scheme and, of course, Cree Conaghy. This is the list of schemes and plans and actions all wrapped up in the government's latest housing plan, Housing for All. Mr O'Brien likes to tell us that this is the first real plan. Of course, it is nothing of the kind. Housing for All joins previous plans, great plans that people like Simon Coveney and Owen Murphy had in Rebuilding Ireland. In case you forgot, Rebuilding Ireland was, and I quote, a comprehensive plan intended to address all aspects of the housing system to address homelessness, accelerate social housing, build more homes and improve the rental sector. Before that, we had Alan Kelly's Labour Party plan called Social Housing Strategy 2020, a plan that was to end waiting lists by 2020 and deliver 35,000 social housing units. They all failed utterly, and that is why we see the catastrophe today, the sheer scale of which continues to astound us all, the sheer stupidity of which is breathtaking. The crisis in which things have never been better for landlords, estate agents, real investment trust funds and funds of various types has never been worse in the state's history for ordinary people looking for the basic right of shelter and accommodation. That failure is not for the want of plans or strategies that I have just listed or actions or blueprints. It is not for the want of photo opportunities, which we regularly get on our TVs every night with you, Minister, press releases and glossy brochures. These plans failed as one is failing because of the utter dependence on the private market to deliver homes and on the investment decisions of funds and developers. All plans and strategies dependent upon awakening the private developers and builders to start building to make it worth their while to provide homes, to breed life into a market by throwing various incentives at landlords and funds to build or rent out homes. We have thrown funds at development funds, access to credit, reduced taxes, changed laws to lure foreign investment in, had car boot sales of state-owned land and properties, all in the belief that we must entice in and breed life into the housing market through the private market. The state has literally moved heaven and earth to grant any wish to developers and private interests in the housing market. The problem is not that the housing market is not working, the problem is that it is working exactly like any market does perfectly well for those who are amassing profit from the market itself. It is a consequence that will bring untold misery and brings untold misery for thousands of people. It is not working well for the people of this state, but for the developers, for banks, for investment funds, for REITs, it is working very well for financial and corporate landlords. It is only when we stop making a market out of a basic right and need of housing that we will address this crisis. We are told that 2030 will be a magical year. Apparently, we will end homelessness by then because we have signed a declaration in Lisbon. It is a housing for all document, so it must be true. Just like in the same year, coincidentally, we are going to reduce our CO2 emissions by 51 per cent. In reality, neither of these things will happen, and certainly not under the present government or with the parties that are in government. It is going to need a political and philosophical change to bring about the desperately needed policies in housing. In the meantime, the eviction ban is the minimum and the absolute minimum that you must do to end this cruel and inhumane situation. I want to give a shout-out for a number of those catastrophic cases that come to my clinic frequently. One of them, Heather, is in the gallery. She was very keen to see how all this works. At 63 years of age, she has been made evicted from a home she has rented in Ballyfermot for 15 years, a home that her and her partner have kept up. They have never failed to pay the rent. She has no chance of having an alternative place to live except a room in a hostel, which, with the health conditions of her and her partner, is not feasible. It is not viable. What is going to happen to her and many older people like her who are facing from eviction into homelessness? What is going to happen to the autistic children, two of them, of a woman who has noticed a quit from a HAP landlord, who cannot find a HAP alternative, has been searching because the current eviction ban allowed her some breathing space. She has been searching for nearly a year now to find a HAP alternative and cannot find it. What is going to happen to her and her children, only they will be pushed into homeless accommodation. Accommodation like one of a family of four children and a couple that I am dealing with, who are two years living in one room. It is a small enough room with children from the ages of nine down to 11 months. The mother has to go up four flights of stairs every day with two small babies and prams. While her husband is out working, she cannot manage to keep doing this. The children have no space to play in. The consequences, the environmental consequences, the psychological consequences, the social consequences of those two small incidents that I am talking about, small in the bigger scheme of things, but huge for them in their lives. The consequences of that are untold, are long-term and will be deeply, deeply affected. That is why this eviction ban must be continued. Come the first of April, interestingly, April Fool's Day, there will be a tsunami of evictions, or at least a tsunami of evictions being faced by tens of thousands of people across the state. I mean that. Do you have any idea, and maybe if you do, you could tell us in your return, how many people are likely to be evicted if this ban is lifted? Do you know the figures, for example, that I see every day in my clinic, or that the other deputies see in their clinic, or indeed you must see in yours? Do you know exactly how many of them are families with children? How many of them are older people with illnesses? How many of them are single people who cannot afford the astronomical rents throughout the state? If you can get those statistics together and put them in a package and honestly look at them, then God forgive you if you do not extend this eviction ban, because I know they will tell a tale. They will tell a tale of misery, of fright, of despair. If you do not do it from 1 April, extend that until you have provided the needed houses, or insisted that rents are brought down to an affordable level, or people can access HAP, then shame on you. You are no Minister for Housing to hold your head up. Thank you, Minister. I am no Minister for Housing to hold your head up. You