Aréir, chaith an Rialtas vóta a chinntigh go mbeidh níos mó saoránach sa tír seo gan dídean sna míonna amach romhainn. Cinneadh dochrach a bhí ann, is é sin rud a dhéarfadh go ligfeadh daoine i ndearmad go deo. Ní féidir leis an Rialtas an cheist shimplí a fhreagairt. Cá rachaidh na daoine seo? Last night, in what must be a first for a Government in this State, the Government took a cold, cruel, heartless and calculated decision to make more citizens homeless throughout this State in the coming months. It was an absolutely despicable act and one which the people in constituencies of every Government and Independent Deputy who voted to enable these evictions will never, ever forget.

Thousands of eviction notices fall due in nine days' time, on the Government's watch. Couples, families, children and even pensioners will face the prospect of losing their homes. I do not know if the Tánaiste heard yesterday when Julie spoke on radio about her situation. Faced with an eviction notice, Julie and her husband, son and grandson are due to be evicted from the house they have rented for 11 years in nine days' time. In her own words, Julie said "we have literally nowhere to go". She said: "I just want to break down and sob my heart out - I just don't know what to do". She has nowhere to live and nowhere to go.

The range of people impacted is wide and far. We are dealing day in and day out with parents, people with long-term illnesses, people with disabilities, care workers, teachers, nurses and professionals who are all facing evictions in the coming weeks. Very few will find alternative accommodation in the rental sector. Many others will be forced to move into the box room with their families or couch surf with friends. They will become the hidden homeless, etched from the Government's official statistics, but homeless nevertheless. Some may emigrate.

Those without options will be forced to present to the local authority for emergency accommodation. With homelessness at record levels in this State, our emergency accommodation is at breaking point. Many councils have no additional capacity and the rest will soon run out. The Tánaiste and his Government already knew this but every single one of them cast their vote last night to make more people homeless. Children, adults, old and young people, teachers, nurses and professionals will be homeless. That is the outworking of the vote last night. The Tánaiste, the Taoiseach and the Minister for Housing, Local Government and Heritage have been asked the question over and over again by Members of the House and those who are taking to national and local media. "Where are we to go?", they ask. The Tánaiste has not answered that. I hope the Independent Deputies who backed up the Government last night will be able to answer that. They have got their 30 pieces of silver but they have turned their backs, just as the Tánaiste has, on renters. Maybe they will give us the answer.

From last night's vote, it is clear this Government has thrown in the towel on renters, but Sinn Féin has not and it never will because the eviction ban can and should be extended. There is still a chance to turn. There is still a chance to avert the impending human catastrophe. Today, my colleague, Deputy Ó Broin, will introduce a Bill to extend the ban on no-fault evictions. It will be a replica of what the Government introduced in October, extending the date to the end of January next year. We will table this Bill for Second Stage debate and a vote next Tuesday. Every single Member of this House will have one last opportunity to do the right thing four days before thousands of eviction notices fall due. It will be a simple decision. Do Deputies stand with those renters who face eviction or will they vote to make them homeless? If the Tánaiste decides to do the wrong thing again, what will he say to Julie who has no hope of finding accommodation? Where are she and the thousands of others like her, who will be evicted and become homeless in nine days' time, to go?

Ní aontaím leis an méid atá ráite ag an Teachta. Is é an aidhm atá ag an Rialtas ná níos mó tithe a chruthú, a thógáil agus a chur i bhfeidhm. Tá plean cuimsitheach againn. Is plean é atá i bhfad níos cuimsithí ná aon phlean eile sa Teach seo. Sin í fírinne an scéil. Níl aon rud ag teacht as an Teachta ach fearg i gcónaí. Is é sin an méid atá uaidh i gcónaí. I do not accept the Deputy's proposition. Extending the eviction ban indefinitely will do far more harm than good and exacerbate the homeless situation. It will not resolve anything. I have not seen any economic analysis anywhere that would suggest an indefinite extension of an eviction ban would create-----

Nobody is arguing that.

The Government has not done any analysis.

Exactly. The Deputy has just said it - no one is arguing.

I have the floor. I have read Deputy Ó Broin's article in The Irish Times this morning. His housing position is to speak to many different audiences at different times, with different messages. To be fair to Deputy Ó Broin-----

By the way, two weeks ago Deputy Doherty said he wanted to extend the eviction ban until 31 December. I pointed out to him how dishonest and disingenuous that was because, of course, he was never going to do that.

That is not what he said.

What did the Deputy do then? In another sleight of hand, he produced a new proposal to go until the end of January. This is the dishonesty of the Deputy's approach of making it up as he goes along.

That is Fianna Fáil's approach.

I read this morning's op-ed in The Irish Times, suitably placed of course by Deputy Ó Broin, who wants to be Mr. Reasonable to everybody.

I am very reasonable.

First, Deputy Ó Broin accepts there is no easy solution to this issue. Second, he says Sinn Féin is not arguing there could be a transformation during the period of the extension, which is precisely what he argued two weeks ago-----

That is not true.

-----about the period of this eviction ban.

That is not true.

It was always temporary to alleviate pressures during the winter time, with the energy crisis and so on. Yet, the Deputy manufactured a premise last week, which he is acknowledging today, that the situation cannot be transformed-----

Where?

-----within the period of a short eviction ban.

However, it can be improved.

Deputy Ó Broin is out of order.

That is the point. The Opposition does not have any ideas on housing. I have read all its stuff.

One good idea-----

I have read its material and there are no ideas.

It is better than having ideas for making people homeless.

However, Sinn Féin has objected-----

Not true

-----to more than 11,600 houses.

The Tánaiste should fact-check that.

I just do not get it.

Can we please have order? There was nobody shouting when Deputy Doherty was speaking.

If this continue, I will suspend the House and we will have no more of it.

I was just making the point that Sinn Féin has objected to 11,687 units.

So did the Tánaiste's brother. That is the reality.

The Tánaiste forgot about that.

The further point I will make is that homelessness and housing is a very serious issue in this country.

The Tánaiste is a hypocrite.

We have acknowledged that. There has, without question, been a fundamental shift in the Government's approach to housing with regard to the level of intervention in the market with regard to social housing. Close to 10,000 social homes were delivered last year and we have a target of 12,000 this year. We have the affordable homes schemes and so forth. The fact is we have the highest levels of home completions, planning permissions and first-time buyers since 2008. The latest completion figures show supply is increasing and we are going in the right direction. There were 30,000 homes completed in 2022. It is about supply. We have a target for this year and we aim to reach that and go for it, in social, affordable and cost-rental housing - right across the board. First-time buyers are now at the highest level since 2008, with more than 16,000 first-time buyers last year. Sinn Féin has abandoned first-time buyers in all of its policies. It has ignored them through its opposition to the help-to-buy and first homes schemes.

The Tánaiste needs to get his head out of the clouds and look at and listen to what is happening on the ground. In his own constituency and throughout the State, there are people who will become homeless in nine days' time. They are from all sectors. They are young and old. We have letters about children who were born a couple of weeks ago, from mothers who have nowhere to go on 1 April. The Tánaiste can stand up here and imitate Deputy Ó Broin all he wants but that is what is happening on the ground. The Tánaiste voted for this. He voted for that mother and her newborn child to become homeless in a couple of days' time.

Every single one of those opposite did the same. The Tánaiste says there are no solutions. We will give him a very simple solution to start off with. What about this? Next Tuesday when we propose legislation to stop that mother and her child and many thousands like her being evicted from 1 April, vote for it.

Hear, hear.

Stand up for renters. Stand up for those who are about to become homeless. Stand up for people in this State and do the right thing.

Thank you Deputy, time is up.

And then use that space to do the emergency actions we have been calling on the Tánaiste and his Ministers to do since October. This is a party and a Government that are out of time and out of ideas. They have abandoned these renters and citizens right across the State.

We proposed and we passed emergency planning before Christmas and Sinn Féin voted against it.

Ah, here. We did not vote against it.

Then they come in today and argue for it. That is a fact. Sinn Féin voted and objected against almost all of our proposals.

The voting record shows that we did not vote against it.

If I could say to the Deputy, we are implementing measures to deal with the issue of homelessness-----

Where will they go?

-----in terms of the in situ scheme, in terms of the leasing and in terms of cost rental measures.

Where is she going?

Where is she going to go?

We already have initiated that scheme some time ago and in terms of interacting with local authorities and directing local authorities, in the event of any eviction notices in respect of homes that the councils buy those.

They are not doing it.

The resources are being made available. I have dealt with cases in the past-----

Go to a Garda station.

-----and I have resolved them working with local authorities.

The Tánaiste is going to be very busy next month. Will we give them his number?

What the Deputies are proposing, they are basically saying-----

Newborn babies in the Tánaiste's county are becoming homeless.

They are basically saying what we are doing today, they would do in a couple of months' time. That is what they are saying. They just said it.

You are going to make newborn babies in your own county homeless. What a future you offer them.

They would do it not at the end of December as they were originally proposing two weeks ago but at the end of January. All Sinn Féin will do is make the situation worse. The Deputy said to me earlier he is not arguing with my basic proposition that an indefinite extension----

Where is the newborn baby in your own county going to go in a couple of days' time?

Thank you. Please.

A Cheann Comhairle, I wanted to finish the sentence but I was interrupted.

Can we stop the barracking, please?

Can the Tánaiste answer? Where are they going to go?

To the Garda station.

The bottom line is this. An indefinite extension of an eviction ban will make matters worse and will exacerbate the homelessness situation. The Deputy agreed with me four or five minutes ago when I said that and he said he was not arguing with that proposition.

Where is the Cork newborn baby going to go? Where are the mother and her newborn baby going to go?

No answer.

Shame on you.

If you think that any of the people out there who are homeless are impressed by this carry on, you are far removed from the reality.

We know exactly what did not impress them.

Can we conduct ourselves----

If the Tánaiste will not answer our questions-----

Deputy Carthy is not leader of the party. I am addressing the acting leader.

I want the Tánaiste to answer a question I have put to him.

Excuse me. The Chair is on his feet. Can we conduct our business in an orderly fashion? I call Deputy Bacik.

Tá ceart tithíochta ag gach duine ach is léir nach gcreideann an Rialtas sa cheart seo. Everyone has a right to a home but the vote by Government and some Independent Deputies yesterday evening tells us that your belief in that right is qualified. Although motions are non-binding, yesterday’s vote sent a devastating message to people in housing distress and housing crisis right now. The vote copper-fastened the fear and anxiety for everyone in the country who is renting and who has received a notice to quit in recent months. It exacerbated the fear of those who have not received a notice to quit but are now in fear that they may be left without a home and may join the thousands of others who are homeless, left to fend for themselves in a rental sector which is in utter meltdown.

As if to make matters worse, the Government has revealed itself to be in a tailspin. This week it announced a series of half-measures frantically cobbled together to shore up support for its position on the counter-motion. These measures are fundamentally incapable of making one iota of difference to all those due to be turfed out of their homes in nine days' time from 1 April onwards. Some of the measures are ill-defined, some appear to be antithetical even to the Government's own purported aims. We heard the Minister for Housing, Local Government and Heritage revealing on the News at One yesterday that he himself was not sure how the proposed first refusal scheme for tenants facing eviction would work, a scheme likely doomed to fail since so few renters could even afford to buy. We saw in The Irish Times yesterday reports that the Minister of State, Deputy Mary Butler has expressed real concerns about the Government plans - only plans at this stage - to allow people in nursing homes to keep 100% of the rental income from their homes. It seems she was not told in advance of this plan despite being the relevant Minister. She is disappointed with the decision which she thinks will prematurely drive people into nursing homes; indeed this is a very likely result and entirely contrary to the programme for Government aims. Has the Government lost control of this? Is there any evidence basis underpinning its approach at all?

At the Business Committee this morning, my colleague, Deputy Duncan Smith confirmed that we will use our Private Members’ time next week to bring forward a motion of no confidence in Government. That is not something we do likely but something we have no choice but to do in the current circumstances. Even at this 11th hour, there is still time for the Tánaiste to reverse the decision and extend the ban. The Government has blocked off time on Tuesday afternoon for statements on the eviction ban. I do not think those statements will be of any use to the thousands of people who have already received a notice to quit. That time could be used to table the Labour Party's alternative Bill. The Tánaiste has accused the Opposition of having no ideas but we do have ideas. I wrote last week to the Taoiseach to supply him with a copy of our emergency legislation. I have a copy here which I can give to the Tánaiste. It would extend the eviction ban until homelessness rates have demonstrably reduced over four consecutive months. It would introduce a new approach, not indefinite extension, but a results-based, not time-based extension of the eviction ban, as the homelessness agencies have been seeking. The Taoiseach has not even done us the courtesy of responding but we are asking the Tánaiste now to take up our Bill. If he will not do so, in next week's motion of no confidence, can be sure he will have the support of the Minister of State, Deputy Butler, or indeed of Deputy Hourigan? Is he confident of support for Government in next week's vote given the housing crisis and given the scale of catastrophe awaiting us from 1 April?

Creideann an Rialtas go bhfuil géarchéim ann ó thaobh cúrsaí tithíochta de, ach is é an difríocht idir an Rialtas agus an Fhreasúra ná go bhfuil plean cuimsitheach ag an Rialtas. Is léir go bhfuil dul chun cinn le feiceáil-----

Níl. Caitear le chéile é ag an nóiméad deireanach.

-----leis an méid tithe atá tar éis a bheith tógtha go dtí seo. Tá sé sin soiléir leis an dul chun cinn a bhí le feiceáil anuraidh i gcomhthéacs cúrsaí tithíochta sa tír seo. The Deputy made a comment as she was articulating her position about the rental market. I think she said it was in free-fall or whatever. I would respectfully say to her that if we keep on demonising landlords-----

We are not.

Nobody has done that.

Is that the best the Tánaiste can do?

I did not interrupt, I did not say the Labour Party Deputies had.

That is not fair. Nobody said anything demonising landlords.

Can the Tánaiste please respond?

Through the Chair, can I say that it should be a fundamental part of parliamentary democracy-----

To tell the truth.

-----that when one side hears the other side without interruption, that the facilitation is responded to. What I want to say is this.

Tell the truth. That accusation is a low blow.

The Sinn Féin party has demonised landlords from the get-go and let us not pretend otherwise.

That is absolutely not true.

That is the bottom line. If I may say the following-----

Gobshite.

-----the easiest thing to do is to call for rent freezes and bans, indefinite bans. What impact do you think that is going to have on the rental market? That is my point. If you indefinitely extend an eviction ban, you undermine the market. We know already there are people leaving the rental side. The figures are clearly there. There was 21,000 home sales last year involving landlords selling their property while 7,500 were bought by landlords. That means a net loss of 13,500 of the rental stock.

And who is in charge?

What the Deputy is proposing, I would respectfully suggest, is adding to the insecurity, adding to the lack of certainty around that. What we need to do is retain those who are renting out their homes at the moment in the rental market and we need to attract new people in with properties to rent to increase the supply. What the Opposition is looking for, in our considered opinion, would damage supply and exacerbate the situation. That is the fundamental point here. There is no one cruel here in this House. No one has a monopoly of empathy. Everybody here wants to do the right thing-----

You are doing the wrong thing.

-----in terms of making sure people are not made homeless and we do as well. People will make all of the political stuff that we have to listen to from time to time but the reality is, it is our considered opinion that if we extend this for three months or six months, the situation gets worse in terms of the exodus from the rental market.

The Government made a last-minute decision and chased after it.

We need to build more houses more quickly. We did 30,000 last year, 10,000 more than the previous year. Even during the last eviction ban up to 7,000 houses were completed and significant addition leasing and so on.

Níl aon phlean ag an Rialtas. It does not have a plan for what will follow for people who are facing homelessness from 1 April. What it presented this week was a series of last minute dot com measures cobbled together, measures which have no hope of meeting the real needs of households facing homelessness from 1 April.

None of us is demonising landlords. We are conscious that small landlords are bearing the brunt of Government failure to ensure an adequate supply of homes for people.

We are not just calling for an extension of the ban. On 9 February, the Labour Party put forward a series of eight emergency measures that we called on the Government to undertake during the duration of a ban to ensure that when the ban was lifted there would be sufficient homes to enable people to move on if they were evicted from their current homes.

The reality is that the Government has no plan in place. The Government countermotion this week refers to a series of measures the Government plans to rapidly introduce. Why were these measures not introduced during the duration of the ban? Why did the Government not engage in modelling? It has no evidence base for lifting the ban.

I want to put a question to the Tánaiste that my colleague, Deputy Ged Nash, tried to put yesterday. How much has it cost the Tánaiste and his Government colleagues to buy the votes of some Independent Deputies in order to evict thousands of people from their homes? This has come at a very high cost to the many renters now facing a cliff edge.

It undermined the Minister of State.

During the time of the current ban, 7,000 social housing units were completed, and in addition 600 were leased and 500 bought, 1,500 voids were returned to use and 500 emergency and 150 cold weather beds were provided. The idea that nothing has been done is just a myth. A lot was done.

It is not enough.

All Deputies seem to accept the ban cannot be indefinite. That is a dishonest position because what will happen every six months is we will have the same row and Deputies will want the ban extended again. We saw that with Sinn Féin. Two weeks ago, it wanted to extend the ban to 31 December and now the date is 31 January.

The Tánaiste is obsessed with Sinn Féin.

Does anyone believe the Opposition would abolish it in six months' time? It would not; it would keep on going. The point is that would make it worse. We genuinely believe that would make it far worse. In the interim, we have to engage with issues. There is no limit to the tenant in situ scheme. We have issued directives to management and managers to buy houses where people face the threat of eviction.

I want to voice my displeasure at again having to sit here through a mockery of what has happened. Nobody won anything yesterday, least of all our reputations for solving problems. I have a headache from listening to rubbish. There is no solution from anybody here. All they want to do is bicker and blame somebody else. All of these things are in their control.

I do not want to shout, so I will calm down and put the issue to the Tánaiste. I received a document from the Minister for Housing, Local Government and Heritage yesterday. I had not decided how I was going to vote because I have spoken about planning for three years. There is a very serious issue, whereby 70,000 planning permissions have been granted but not yet commenced. They will not be commenced until the Government deals with the issue of viability. Developers are not building houses because they are being granted planning permission for houses that are not wanted and people will not buy. The only people who are buying housing units at a particular level of density are housing bodies and county councils.

The Government and Minister have failed to influence a policy that makes viability a planning consideration. I am a member of the Regional Group which put forward eight very constructive proposals but the Government cannot implement that pertaining to viability. Instead of reducing densities, which is what I have asked for three years in order to encourage viability, the document I have received refers to increasing density. Can the Tánaiste believe that? He probably does not know what I am talking about because the Minister did not, which is worrying. We are talking about homelessness and blaming landlords. There will not be another unit built if the Government continues with this policy. The Minister told me he received this document the night before I did. I can understand why because he must have asked a young first-year college student to write it. He certainly did not get anybody with any brains to write it.

If the Tánaiste reads the blacks of the House over the past three years, he will realise 70,000 planning permissions have been commenced and will read about the advice I have given over the past three years regarding planning policy process. It is time that we all stopped the BS - I will not say the word, a Cheann Comhairle. It is a time for us to pull together because if one homeless child in Wexford is not accommodated, I will bring the child here and he or she will sit on the Ceann Comhairle's lap. I want an answer as to why the Minister would insult my intelligence and that of the developers who are trying to help people in this country.

I do not agree with the old trope that is put out that everybody is talking rubbish except myself, which is what the Deputy's position is. We need to reflect on that. This is a parliamentary debate where people have legitimate views they can put forward. I may disagree with the Opposition on certain issues but I respect its right to put points to me. I do not declare everything is rubbish and say the Minister is listening to people with no brains as if everybody out there is foolish and stupid.

Is the Tánaiste going to address the-----

I am addressing the issue. The Deputy made those points and it is legitimate for Government to robustly defend what it is doing in respect of housing. The Housing for All plan is a plan. I have seen no other plan in terms of comprehensiveness or actual schemes, from the affordable housing scheme to the first homes scheme, Croí Cónaithe, the cost-rental scheme, the 30,000 houses and apartments built last year and a range of budget initiatives. Without question, there has been a fundamental intervention in housing by the Government. That cannot be argued with. What can be argued with is the pace and scale and how we can deliver more houses more quickly. Modern methods of construction is one effective way of doing that.

In respect of planning, we have published a comprehensive planning Bill which will encounter opposition in the House. That is legitimate for people who oppose it. The Government has taken decisive action in respect of a fundamental reform of our planning code because we need to improve delivery on the planning side.

I do not believe we should make viability a condition of planning because we would never get anything through An Bord Pleanála or judicial review.

I said it should be a planning consideration.

It should not be part of the planning process. It should be part of policy, in terms of-----

It is not, and this is-----

Please, Deputy.

Developers will argue on a continuous basis for more and more responses. We listen to what builders and people more generally are saying. In respect of compact apartment building, I accept there is a viability issue. We have taken measures to try to improve that situation and we are reviewing other measures which can help viability if we can take costs out.

The Government has taken measures to make matters worse.

No, we do not take measures to make matters worse. I have already outlined that 30,000 houses were built last year. There are now more people working in the construction industry.

There are 60,000 private renters on HAP.

As I said, we had the largest number of first-time buyers last year. That is not the picture the Deputy created in her presentation. In addition, next year there will be higher targets in respect of social housing and the work of the Land Development Agency. The foundations are there. We have to keep this going for the next ten years in terms of the level of housing we have to build. We need faster and better delivery on the planning side.

The foundations have not been dug, never mind there. That is the problem. There are 70,000 housing units with planning permission ready to go. Does the Tánaiste understand viability? Could he pass that information on to the Minister for Housing, Local Government and Heritage because he does not know what the specific planning policy requirement is? We do not get that in what the Tánaiste has spoken about, namely, the planning and development Bill. We get it from the document I received from the Minister, which is the greatest load of rubbish.

We have to introduce a specific planning policy requirement whereby county development plans are already formed in order to change densities. We are months away from doing so - perhaps six to 12 months. That is why there will not be houses built or first-time buyers purchasing homes. I am not worried about first-time buyers; I am worried with those being evicted by landlords who can no longer pay mortgages because of interest rates and for many other reasons.

The Tánaiste is expecting landlords to do his job without compensating them. We should not have an eviction ban. It is the Tánaiste's fault and the Government's fault. That is why we have it. The Government is expecting landlords to do its job. It has a solution but it does not understand it.

We are not all as ingenious as the Deputy is.

The Taoiseach has said that a number of times now.

I want to make the point that in the past year 30,000 houses were built. The Deputy keeps saying that not a house will be built. Some 30,000 were built in the past year and we need to do more in the years to come. I am interested in first-time buyers. The Deputy may not be, but I am.

The Tánaiste will not be-----

The younger generation needs access to housing too. Younger people need to know that over the next decade, as they come out of school and get into work, and so on-----

This Government's policies have locked three generations out of buying a house.

With the greatest of respect, I listened to the Deputy and I did not interrupt her. She seems incapable of hearing an alternative viewpoint. She is playing to a gallery and an audience here. I am trying to address the issues here and she is playing politics.

I am not playing to a gallery. How dare the Tánaiste say that?

I will say what I wish to say, which is in accordance with the parliamentary process. I am endeavouring to make our point and I am being constantly interrupted all of the time. The Deputy either wants a reasonable debate, during which we can go through the issues, or she does not.

The Tánaiste is not able to answer the question, is that it?

The problem is with the language the Deputy uses. According to her, everybody is stupid except herself. That is exactly what the Deputy is saying.

I did not say that but if that is how the Tánaiste heard it, and if the cap fits, let the Tánaiste wear it.

The Tánaiste’s time is up, and I thank the Deputies. Perish the thought of what people at home think when they look in at this sort of carry-on. Please, can we have a little bit of order? I call Deputy Nolan.