‘Daft report shows government sitting on its hands’, says local TD

People Before Profit TD Paul Murphy says the most recent Daft.ie report shows the housing and rental crisis continues to deteriorate at a frightening pace.

He also accused the government of sitting ‘on its hands while the chronic crisis continues to get worse.’

“The rental and housing crisis has yet again reached a new low,” Deputy Murphy said.

“With this report showing that the availability of rental properties is the lowest ever and prices are 12.6% from this time last year it shows that the government has sat on its hands and done very little to address the crisis.

“Our rental model in this country where we rely on private landlords to house so many people is deeply flawed.

“What we need are radical measures including the declaration by the government of a housing emergency.

“Instead of a reliance on the market to deliver housing, we need socialist policies which put the right of people to a home before landlords’ and developers’ profits.

“We need an emergency public house building programme which builds mass numbers of public houses on public land. It is also abundantly clear that we need real rent controls and to actually cut rents and bring them back to affordable levels.

“People all over this country are being seriously affected by this crisis. The homeless figures continue to soar, people are having to fork out huge amounts of their income on rents, and students cannot find accommodation before the college term. This situation is untenable for the government and they must no longer sit on their hands while the crisis gets worse.”

The Daft report notes that the number of rental properties is at an all time low with rental prices at the highest levels in the last 15 years.