Go raibh maith agat, a Leas-Cheann Comhairle. I might try to go back to football-----

We started well.

-----to wish Troy Parrott and our boys in green all the best of luck tonight in Prague. We are all hoping for a hat-trick.

Tá cruachás na gcostas maireachtála ag éirí níos measa, go háirithe ó thaobh tionóntaí de. The cost-of-living emergency is getting worse. The measures the Government announced mean the cost of living will remain stubbornly high for workers and families who cannot make ends meet. Renters are not immune from this crisis and are in fact the worst hit as they face double-digit rent increases under the Government’s rent hike Bill and sky-high energy and grocery bills. We are also seeing a growing wave of evictions - in fact, the highest rate of evictions since the Famine. There was a 41% increase in evictions in the last quarter of 2025. Today we learn house prices are up again, this time by nearly 4% in the year to March, which pushes home ownership further out of reach. This rolling series of mass evictions is the result of the housing policies of Fine Gael and Fianna Fáil. We have had 20 families in Limerick, 14 families in an apartment complex in Ballybane in Galway and six incredibly vulnerable households in a retirement village in Sligo, including Frank, an 88-year-old wheelchair user with dementia, and his wife Elizabeth, aged 84, who has been his carer. Is the eviction of an elderly couple with dementia from a retirement home the housing policy the Tánaiste stands over?

While the Minister and his Department roll out the red carpet for institutional investors in Cannes with the promise of higher rents and higher returns, 41% of renters are at risk of poverty and a growing number spend 50% of their income on rent. Tomorrow the homeless figures will set another shameful record and there has been nearly a decade of foot-dragging on the regulation of short-term lets. The housing crisis is being paid for by renters, who have nowhere to go when evicted, and Fianna Fáil told us six years ago it would solve the housing crisis and Fine Gael said the same thing a decade ago. We are still waiting and the problem is getting worse. In Spain, as part of its response to the crisis, the Sánchez Government has extended rental agreements by two years, which will stop evictions and freeze rents, while here in Ireland, Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael are facilitating a wave of mass evictions and allowing landlords to hike the rent to the market rate in between tenancies.

As rents surge and a tsunami of evictions gets under way, will the Government intervene to protect renters? Will it freeze rent increases like Spain has and will it put a moratorium on evictions? What new cost-of-living measures will this Government bring forward for renters? Will it at the very least double the renter’s tax credit, as Labour has called for?

I thank Deputy Sheehan for raising the matter and the impact of the real cost-of-living pressures, the current conflict and how, for the purposes of his question, they are having a particular impact on those renting as well. I will make a couple of points. One of the reasons the Government this week provided a package of €250 million for a time-bound period was a recognition that the economic medicine we are endeavouring to administer now may need a different type of prescription in the time ahead. I say that genuinely with humility because I cannot predict - respectfully, no one in this House can, and I am not sure there are many people in the world who can - where the scale of economic challenge will go and where the key areas of pressure may be in the time ahead. The Deputy has not done this, but I certainly would not want the Government's position to be misrepresented to suggest we are talking about the end of May and then we will see an end to this moment of economic challenge. That is not looking likely, based on what we see now. We may well have to come back to the House at future moments and indeed in budgets in the time ahead and have conversations about further assistance and interventions to support our economy and our people, should this conflict go on for a prolonged period. I know we all hope it de-escalates and ends because the quickest way to provide economic stability and move through this period of economic challenge is, of course, for this awful conflict to stop. That is before we even get to the humanitarian impact of war, which we should never be numb to in this House.

I disagree with the Deputy on how investors are presented. Even the Housing Commission report recognised that while the Government has to continue to invest more in housing, private investment will also be required. We need people to come to this country and invest privately in building and providing homes too. That is good and I think all parts of this island, and the Administrations in both parts of this island, were represented in trying to attract investment at the event in Cannes.

On short-term lets, the Deputy makes a fair point that this has been going on for quite a while. It is important we get it right and we are moving towards legislating on this. I have had very good meetings with the Ministers, Deputies Burke and Browne, in recent days on it.

We want to make sure we can provide additional housing stock but also protect housing stock for the tourism industry, particularly in rural Ireland. We almost have a way forward on that.

We have a different view when it comes to protections for renters. I genuinely believe the Bill we brought forward does bring in a suite of measures to protect tenants, the likes of which we have not seen in this country before. There will be six-year tenancies for the first time ever. The RPZs will be done on a nationwide basis for the first time ever. I recall when this Dáil was first convened many in the Opposition thought the Government was going to get rid of the RPZs. Not only did we not get rid of the RPZs, we made them nationwide. As well as that we brought in what are effectively bans on no fault evictions for future tenancies.

I am concerned about what the Deputy said about the case in County Sligo. There are clear rules but there is also basic compassion and decency. If the Deputy sends me further details, I would be very happy to look into it.

The Tánaiste selectively quoted from a number of sources, including the Housing Commission. The fact of the matter in regard to short-term lets is the Government is already talking about weakening the legislation by increasing the population cap and putting in exemptions that were not there when the original legislation was mooted.

The housing crisis has become so severe that an 88-year-old with dementia is being evicted in County Sligo as we speak. That is how bad it has become under the watch of this Government. In his response, the Tánaiste did not actually address the question I asked, which was: what new cost-of-living measures will the Government bring forward to protect renters? Will the Government look at increasing the renter's tax credit? At the very least it is something the Government could, and should, do because this cost-of-living crisis is impacting renters the most. They are the most vulnerable people in the housing system at the moment.

We brought in measures this week that benefit everybody in terms of the cost of fuel at the pump. That was the important and right thing to do. What the Deputy is highlighting in this House today concerns renters. I say this respectfully; I hear other people highlighting different aspects in media and newspaper commentary. We have to be very careful with the economic interventions we make. There is an annual budgetary process. We will have an annual budget. We have a rent tax credit in place and have funded that tax credit for the years ahead. We will no doubt have a debate and discussion, and there are commitments in the programme for Government on the scale of the renter's tax credit as well. I have to be very honest with the Deputy. We need to have a comprehensive understanding of the depth and duration of this economic challenge. Tomorrow, I will attend a special Eurogroup meeting on this specifically, because we also need to continue to engage and see what other countries are doing too.

On the issue of the short-term lets, I do not accept there is a watering down. There is a change but it is not a watering down. We have to get the balance right here. I do not think anybody intended, or certainly I did not - I not sure the Deputy did - that there would be a situation where crucial rental properties in small rural communities would be taken out of the tourism sector so we have to get that proposal right and arrive at a balanced way forward, and we will. Renters, people who own homes and all people in the country will benefit from the €250 million intervention and the Government will remain nimble, agile and willing to act further should this economic crisis globally deepen in the time ahead.