Housing Schemes
Dail Éireann — 2026-10-01
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Eoin Ó Broin (SF), Dublin Mid-West

For every week or month that passes before a decision is made on this matter, a significant number of people will lose their position on local authority housing waiting lists. I have constituents who became homeless from their HAP tenancy, went into emergency accommodation and are marginally above the thresholds of my own local authority. Because income is now reassessed for eligibility as part of the annual review, they were removed for the social housing waiting list. They lost nine years on the list. They have no possible exit from emergency accommodation because they cannot afford private rental, if they could find it, and do not have family to stay with. As the Minister's party colleague has rightly said, there are also thousands of people who have no hope of renting or buying privately. In many counties, particularly the ten counties that are in band 3, there is no cost rental. They would not be able to afford that, and they are excluded from the list. I am asking the Minister to inject some urgency into this. The increase needs to be significant. I would make the very strong case that those ten counties in band 3 should all be in band 2 at a minimum. I urge the Minister to proceed with his suggestion of index-linking the increases, so that annually they keep track of the economy, wages and the cost of housing in the private market.

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Record URI: https://data.oireachtas.ie/akn/ie/debateRecord/dail/2026-10-01/debate/main
Retrieved: 2026-10-05T01:01:00+00:00
Sitting date: 2026-10-01