Homelessness: Statements Seanad Éireann — 2026-04-15 ============================================================ Christopher O'Sullivan (FF), Cork South-West It is an honour to be in the Seanad today to talk about such an incredibly important issue, that is, homelessness in Ireland. I will set out the new housing plan, Delivering Homes, Building Communities 2025-2030, which is building on the progress made in recent years to increase housing delivery across the board and social housing, in particular. The Minister, Deputy Browne, will conclude today’s discussion by outlining the many actions in the new housing plan that are targeted at ending homelessness. The Government is acutely aware that homelessness is the single most pressing social issue that we face and of the impact that experiences of homelessness have on households and children, in particular. With this in mind, the programme for Government and the new housing plan reaffirmed Ireland's commitment to working towards ending homelessness by 2030. Increased supply is key to addressing homelessness. Last year saw the highest number of homes completed in more than a decade at more than 36,000. Delivering homes, building communities builds on the achievements and progress already made under Housing for All to further accelerate housing delivery. The key difference between Housing for All and this plan is a greater emphasis on creating the environment for more homes. To deliver more homes at speed, the State will indeed do more but this plan will also empower others, particularly the private sector, to play their part. A significantly greater supply of housing can be achieved through a balanced approach focused on both directly supporting people to have a home of their own but also creating the best possible conditions for the industry to build and activate more homes. This new plan commits to the building of 300,000 new homes. By the end of 2030, there will be 72,000 additional new build social homes built for those in our society that need them most. Our goal remains a housing system that truly serves the needs of our people. This is why we are committed to also providing 90,000 affordable housing supports. Delivering homes, building communities is ambitious, but the Government is fully committed to making it a reality. This is an integrated housing and homelessness plan that reaffirms the whole-of-government approach to addressing the housing crisis. It will ensure that the funding and strategies deployed to address housing and homelessness are fully aligned at all times. Direct funding for housing is at record levels. In 2026 alone, over €9 billion in capital funding will be provided through the Exchequer, the Land Development Agency and the Housing Finance Agency. A supply of housing and accommodation, in particular social, as well as affordable and private, remains the essential solution to addressing the challenges of homelessness and precarious living conditions in the longer term. A total of 36,284 new dwellings were completed in 2025. This represents a 20.4% increase on the same period in the previous year. This marks the highest number of completions recorded in any given year since the CSO began recording this data series in 2011. In 2025, a total of 9,089 new build social homes were constructed. This is the highest delivery level on record. It is an increase of 1,256 homes, or a 16% increase, compared to 2024. Over 42,000 new build social homes have been delivered between 2022 and 2025. The latest figures show that 3,423 new homes were commenced in February of this year, an increase of 232% compared to the same period last year. Combined with January’s figures, 5,469 new homes have commenced since the start of the year, an increase of 147% on the 2,214 units commenced during the same period in 2025. To put things in a clearer perspective, across 2024 and 2025 combined, a total of 85,723 units were commenced. This represents an increase of 43% compared with the combined total for the previous two-year period. Delivering homes, building communities takes pragmatic action across a number of different policy areas to boost housing supply, while ensuring that the new homes delivered support people who need them most. These two key objectives provide the foundational pillars in the plan: activating supply and supporting people. The first pillar, activating supply, is about removing structural barriers to homebuilding and ensuring we deliver 300,000 new homes in the lifetime of this plan. This includes measures aimed at unlocking land, reforming planning, delivering infrastructure and creating the conditions needed to increase investment in housing supply. Reaching the target of 300,000 new homes will only be achieved through the individual and collective effort of the key delivery partners. Local authorities, together with approved housing bodies, the Land Development Agency and the construction sector will be critical to delivering and enabling the delivery of the quantum of homes needed over the lifetime of the plan. Central government will provide the policy, regulatory and funding frameworks to support housing delivery. Further to this, delivering homes, building communities is enabled by the largest ever capital investment in the history of the State. A total of €275 billion will be invested over the next ten years under the national development plan to significantly upgrade our infrastructure and make the environment for building homes much better. This cannot be overstated. This includes almost €20 billion to supply the delivery of the 72,000 social homes and 90,000 affordable home supports over the next five years. It also includes €12.2 billion for water and wastewater services and €3.5 billion in equity funding for ESB Networks and EirGrid to make sure that we have the capacity in these vital services to make housing connections as and when they are needed. The Uisce Éireann investment is particularly significant. In January this year, the Government announced a new multi-annual €1 billion housing infrastructure investment fund to support direct investment in housing enabling infrastructure. The new fund will be managed by the housing activation office and will complement investment by infrastructure agencies, such as Uisce Éireann and ESB Networks, as part of a more co-ordinated approach. It will focus on projects that can move quickly and at scale. We want strong, deliverable projects that can hit the ground running and start unblocking housing delivery immediately. Housing delivery is at the centre of the revised national development plan. We are investing €102 billion over the next five years, an additional €33.9 billion on the previous NDP allocation. Overall investment of over €40 billion will be provided for housing and related water services to 2030. This funding will support vital water infrastructure projects, address historic bottlenecks in the system and accelerate us towards our delivery targets. Over the lifetime of the plan, we will deliver an average of 12,000 new social homes each year. This is an unprecedented commitment. In parallel, we will provide an average of 15,000 affordable housing supports annually through the starter homes programme and related initiatives. The help to buy and the first home scheme continue to bridge the gap for first-time buyers struggling with deposits and mortgage limits. These schemes are not abstract policy instruments; they are enabling thousands of households to purchase their first home. Budget 2026 has continued the record level of investment in social housing, with €2.9 billion in capital allocated to support the delivery of social homes by local authorities. This continued investment in the social housing programme will increase the supply of stock available to allocate to households on the social housing waiting list, including households in emergency accommodation. The Government is not burying its head in the sand when it comes to homelessness. We are acutely aware there are far too many people in homelessness. Over 17,000 is unacceptable, and we as Government are trying to move every possible lever of the State to ensure we deliver homes at speed and at scale so that we can reduce these homelessness figures. We have significantly increased direct investment in addressing homelessness, but as well as that, we are enabling an environment where the public and private sectors can contribute to the solutions when it comes to homelessness. We appreciate people in emergency accommodation, people on our streets and people who find themselves in homelessness go through incredible difficulty – . We understand and appreciate the turmoil and how this upends their lives. I assure the House - and the Minister, Deputy Browne, will elaborate on this in his closing statement - that as a Government, we are doing everything possible to ensure we can end homelessness in Ireland once and for all --- Source: Houses of the Oireachtas. Licensed under CC BY 4.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/). The Official Report is revised after first publication; the fetch timestamp below identifies the version quoted. Record URI: https://data.oireachtas.ie/akn/ie/debateRecord/seanad/2026-04-15/debate/main Retrieved: 2026-08-14T04:54:48+00:00 Sitting date: 2026-04-15