I start by sending the full support of the Anti-Austerity Alliance to the secondary school teachers today.

I do not feel I have any choice but to raise with the Tánaiste the disaster of the housing crisis. All the signs are that the Government's housing strategy is a bumbling disaster. Even if its myriad plans ever emerge, it will take years for houses to actually be built. The top management in Dublin City Council has confirmed to me that no serious amount of houses will be built for at least two years. Fingal County Council, which is the Tánaiste's own local authority, has a staggering figure of 38 new builds planned so the figures just do not stack up. In fact, the Tánaiste seems to be oblivious to a housing crisis in her own area of Dublin 15 and Dublin West. Families in Dublin West are becoming homeless for a second time. Not a single new council house is planned for the greater Blanchardstown area, which is in the Tánaiste's constituency.

While the Government is sweeping rough sleepers off the streets and putting them indoors, whole family homelessness is continuing unabated. The mix will be added to by a crackdown by the banks to repossess homes, including buy-to-lets, with no protection for tenants in those properties. Since families cannot expect a home any time soon from this Government, can the Tánaiste tell us what it is going to do in the meantime?

The one tiny measure it took to prevent homelessness was to set up a Threshold emergency helpline to negotiate rent supplement increases behind closed doors. The Government could have allowed community welfare officers to do this anyway but they do not have any power to keep people in their homes in the case of repossession or eviction. Interestingly, 47% of calls to the Threshold line come from north county Dublin, which includes the Tánaiste's constituency.

The Tánaiste and her Department must take major blame for the homelessness crisis. They are relying on the private sector to house council tenants and those waiting on homes. Between the Government and its Fianna Fáil predecessors, rent supplement has been cut by 28%. The top ups that we know most people must pay have gone up by 67%. That is through a combination of increasing the minimum amount a family must pay and reducing the maximum rent limits. Is it any wonder there are a million people on the breadline, which has been confirmed in surveys today?

The Tánaiste stated in 2012 that there would be no incidence of homelessness from rent supplement decreases. She actually said they were a positive move. Obviously, she is not going to listen to the Anti-Austerity Alliance and the housing action groups that are out there but for how long will she stubbornly ignore what housing agencies are telling her from the front line? Focus Ireland and Threshold categorically say that rent supplement is one of the immediate cases of the sharp rise in family homelessness. They have called the rent limits in Dublin a fiction. Some of these people are long-time members of the Labour Party so would the Taoiseach not listen to them?

While people wait for the Government's illusory houses, will it at least agree to put a bandage on the haemorrhage of homelessness? Number one, will it reverse the rent supplement cuts and revise the limits, particularly in Dublin where the crisis is most acute? Will it stop dithering and introduce rent controls, which are so obviously needed and are called for by all the agencies? There is nothing unconstitutional about them. Will it direct the banks to stop repossessions which result in evictions of families from their homes and instead agree to keep those families in their homes renting, which they would like to do? If the Government will not agree to do this, would it agree that the next step is what county managers are calling modular housing - shanty towns, container homes and prefabs?

Social housing is a key priority for this Government. We have set out an additional €2.2 billion in the budget for 2015 and the next three years to provide social housing. As the Deputy may be aware, particularly in Dublin West, housing construction has actually recommenced. This will help huge numbers of people interested in buying a starter family home on an affordable mortgage basis to find a home as opposed to what has been happening since the banking collapse, namely, many families being forced to rent in a market where rents have certainly increased in recent times.

Rents have increased significantly, as we know from various reports. The commitment of €2.2 billion in the budget to provide for social housing is probably the most radical and largest investment in providing social homes for families who need to be housed. It is a key priority for the Labour Party and Fine Gael. As Deputy Coppinger was a member of a Dublin local authority for a significant period of time, she will be aware that some time around 2000, under the previous Government, for reasons that have not been fully explored the local authorities basically stopped building social housing.

That is not true.

We are now commencing-----

The Labour Party controlled Dublin City Council for the last five years.

She is misleading the House.

Deputy Ó Fearghaíl, please.

We are now commencing a very ambitious social housing programme.

She already misled the people.

The Tánaiste has the floor.

That social housing programme will make significant provision for new housing units over the year. In addition, particularly in Dublin City Council but also to a lesser extent in the other local authorities in Dublin, Cork and Limerick, local authorities adopted the unfortunate practice of boarding up houses and flats whenever vacancies occurred.

Dublin City Council was controlled by the Labour Party.

A crash programme is now under way, and is bearing fruit as I speak, to reopen those houses, which should never have been boarded up in the first place.

The Government starved Dublin City Council of funds.

That is going to add significantly to the supply of housing over this year.

On a point of order-----

There are no points of order during Leaders' Questions.

-----the Tánaiste is misleading the House, and not for the first time, on this matter.

Fianna Fáil gave people private sector shoe boxes under Part V.

They are sleeping in cars under this Government.

The Galway tent.

I ask Members to desist.

History will show-----

There were many ways for developers to get around Part V because they wrote Fianna Fáil's housing plan.

Order, please.

Give the Tánaiste the opportunity to withdraw her remarks

With this investment, we will have an enormous increase in the number of houses being made available. Deputy Coppinger referred to the Threshold protocol, which was established by my Department in the middle of June. I am sure she is aware that the protocol has worked very well. Where families have been approached by landlords in regard to a threatened increase in the rent, through the combined offices of my Department, Threshold and other housing associations we have been ensuring those families can stay in their homes and, more importantly, we are dealing with families on a case-by-case basis. I want to send a message in this regard.

Is it a truthful one?

If a family in receipt of rent supplement has a difficulty with a landlord who is increasing the rent, I want them to use the protocol because it has worked reasonably well for those families who have used it. Deputies should acknowledge the work done by the staff of my Department in the homelessness unit and of voluntary organisations like Threshold. The protocol is working well and is being extended around the country as we speak.

It is amazing, when the thrust of my question was about rent allowance and rent supplement, that the Tánaiste failed to mention those words even once in her reply. These are issues over which her Department has control. She is the person in charge of rent supplement and imposing rent limits, which are adding to the homeless crisis. She did not answer my question but I hope the Leas-Cheann Comhairle allows her additional time to do so.

The Tánaiste has been dithering on the question of rent controls for a long time. We were told that the proverbial committee was looking into the issue. Does she agree there is no other solution to preventing the escalation of rents in Dublin in particular, and in other cities? Threshold now has to print out the telephone numbers of Deputies to hand them out to people who seek its advice. They are being sent to my door but that is okay because I will send them to the Tánaiste's door from now on.

With regard to house building, I ask the Tánaiste to table a debate on housing in this House. No time has been set aside to allow us to question her figures. We would love to see houses being built but the problem is that the Government is relying on public-private partnerships, Part V arrangements and landlords. Very few new builds are coming on stream but even if we see more construction, what is going to happen during the two years we will be waiting for the houses to be completed? Where in Dublin West has housing construction restarted? Nobody has seen a building worker or a crane in Dublin West for the last five years.

The Tánaiste said one untrue thing. I was on Fingal County Council for 11 years. Council building projects have decreased since her Government came to power.

That is correct.

I can give her the figures. The situation was better under Fianna Fáil than under the current Government.

That is an endorsement.

This Government allowed fewer than 300 houses to be built last year, while allowing 500 council houses to be sold off. Council housing stock has actually decreased under the Labour Party.

The truth hurts.

I ask the Deputy to frame a question.

If the Tánaiste is really confident about her figures, she might table a debate so that she and the Minister for the Environment, Community and Local Government can show us where the houses are being built.

Given that we are having an exchange of questions and views, perhaps the Deputy can explain why the people associated with her party who sit on the local authority of which she was once a member voted against a social housing development before Christmas.

In Fingal.

She might find out because one of the issues is that parties such as the Deputy's have to persuade their representatives on local authorities to be positive in terms of allowing social housing to be constructed.

Will the Tánaiste answer my question on rent allowance?

Perhaps the Deputy should investigate the issues arising and whether they could have been resolved. I do not know what drove the opposition but it would be interesting to find out. The Deputy made a comment about local authorities selling houses to council tenants. Since 1973 there is a long-standing policy, which I understood was supported by most parties in this House, that people who held long-term tenancies in local authority houses could be in a position to apply to purchase their homes at a certain point. I heard the Deputy condemn the right of people who live in local authority estates.

What is the Tánaiste talking about?

By implication, she is condemning the local authorities for selling houses to tenants on a tenant purchase scheme.

That scheme has been discontinued.

Social mobility is a good thing.

She is wrong in that regard.

My question was on rent supplement.

The newly appointed Fingal county manager has brought forward an extremely ambitious programme, starting with the identification of the sites and areas in Swords, Blanchardstown and the wider Dublin 15 area where new social housing can be built. That is a positive development which will result in many thousands of families getting the homes they want.

What about rent supplement?

Rent supplement is a critical support for 75,000 individuals and families who are housed through the scheme. The protocol established last June is working very well on a case-by-case basis.

It is not working.

A Leas-Cheann Comhairle, can I get an answer to my question?