I thank the Labour Party for tabling this motion. There are a number of elements to it and I will discuss some of them. We all know the housing targets are insufficient. The Government has asked the ESRI to do a piece of work on projecting housing need. The Government is going to base its targets on that. I have just come from a meeting of the housing committee on the planning Bill. We were discussing this ESRI report and how the whole issue of pent-up demand is not included in the terms of reference given to it by…

I will ask about two aspects of this. First, what will happen in the case of management companies where there are serious and known fire safety defects but the management company is not engaging? That can be very unfair on the individual homeowners and residents. As the Minister knows, management companies are not properly regulated and they need to be. What will the Minister do about that? The second issue is where homes with serious fire safety defects are being sold on, often to unsuspecting buyers. There have b…

There should be a legal obligation to declare. When someone gets a survey the surveyors generally do not start opening up the walls to see whether there is fire stopping in place. They tend not to do those kinds of invasive survey works, so there are deficiencies in that process. Given that it is unethical to knowingly sell a defective property, should there not be a legal change to give buyers protection? Is that something the Government will consider? When management companies do not engage but individual residen…

On behalf of the Social Democrats, I extend our sympathies to the family and friends of John Bruton on his passing. Our thoughts are with his wife Finola; his son Matthew and daughters Juliana, Emily and Mary-Elizabeth; our colleague Richard; his sister Mary; and all his extended family. We also offer our condolences to his many colleagues in Fine Gael and to those who served with him in a variety of roles in public life and in government. John Bruton dedicated his life to public service. He played a key role in wo…

Khaled Kamal Abdel Aziz Rashwan was 34 years old. Rose Ramez Amin Hassouna was 21 years old. Samir Rajab Muhammed Al-Saafin was 62 years old. Amr Mostafa Amin Nofal was 12 years old. Maria Amjad Majed Abu Odeh was five years old. Fatima Muhammad Ali Abu Omra was 91 years old. Janan Hamed Nasser Al-Astal was one year old. Every single person that has been killed in Gaza has a name, a face and a story. They were people with hopes and dreams for the future they have been robbed of. The slaughter of innocent people in …

We have done that before.

Time and again, the National Competitiveness and Productivity Council has warned that the lack of affordable housing is a key risk to the economy. It is absolutely infuriating for individuals and families who work hard to save up to buy homes to see vulture funds swooping in to snatch them up. In Belcamp Manor in Balgriffin, 85% of the housing estate has been bought by the investment arm of Deutsche Bank, an €800 billion fund. Mouthwatering rents of €3,175 are now being sought for these homes. The Minister with res…

I thank Deputy Ó Broin for putting forward this very important motion. It is not an unrealistic expectation that the Minister would engage more seriously when these motions are put forward. I do not mean the Minister of State currently present in the Chamber: I mean the senior Minister who has left. In a situation of record homelessness that is higher than ever seen before in the history of the State I would expect the senior Minister to come in and acknowledge that, acknowledge the absolute trauma this causes for …

That is not true. The Minister is misleading the Dáil. We wanted them all to be affordable homes.

That is not true. We wanted them all to be affordable.

Building private homes.

The Government opposed our amendments to improve it.

We supported 1,200 affordable homes in Donabate.

You do not listen.

I wish to ask the Minister about rogue landlords. Salvador Chavez Morales, a computer engineer, was left short of food and at risk of becoming homeless after he was evicted by landlord Marc Godart. What had Salvador done to prompt this eviction? He had made a complaint about being recorded in his home live on CCTV cameras and was evicted as a result. Marc Godart is renting out 208 beds across 19 properties in Dublin city centre. In one property alone on Cork Street, 33 beds are being rented out. The Residential Ten…

I move amendment No. 1 to amendment No. 1: To insert the following after "arguments from opposition parties": "calls on the Government to: — introduce legislation to impose a stamp duty surcharge on the bulk purchase of homes by investment funds at a minimum rate of 100 per cent". In 2022, as the figures released today show, 395 homes were bulk-purchased and last year 623 homes were bulk-purchased, with the funds paying this 10% stamp duty rate that the Government told us would get rid of this terrible practice of …

It is important that everyone can access public transport safely. At Clongriffin DART station, there is an urgent need for safe, universal public access to be provided for commuters from Baldoyle. Recently, a decision was taken by a developer to close this access after midnight. This means that shift workers returning home on the night bus are cut off from getting back to their homes in Baldoyle when they get off the bus. There is an urgent need to reopen the access on a 24-hour basis. There is an urgent need to pr…

Are you calling for it?

We can look at the entire Bill with the view that the role being created is simply not strong enough. It is unthinkable that the mayor would not be able to appoint their own staff in their own office. I cannot think you would have a directly elected mayor in other jurisdictions with legislative provisions like this. Maybe the Minister of State will tell us what other countries have these sorts of arrangements in place. That would be useful.

This is a discussion about whether a mayor who is directly elected by the people of Limerick will be able to appoint the staff in his or her immediate office. We are talking about five staff. There is no city anywhere in the world in which the directly elected mayor cannot appoint his or her own staff. The norm is that directly elected mayors are responsible for the appointment and management of all staff in the entire local authority area or city of which they are the mayor. This is a discussion about the five sta…