‘Leave politics at the door' – New Housing Oireachtas chair calls for cross party unity in tacking ‘biggest issue' facing the country
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A government TD elected chairperson of an Oireactas committee tasked with leading the State's response to Ireland's ever growing housing crisis has said the time has come to 'leave politics at the door' in order to broker real and lasting change.
Longford-Westmeath Fine Gael TD Micheál Carrigy issued the appeal as he addressed members of the Oireacthas Committee on Housing, Local Government and Heritage following his appointment by Tánaiste Simon Harris two weeks earlier.
Mr Carrigy has already spoken of his own awareness over the challenges his new role will likely bring alongside a need to remove some of the barriers that have continued to hamstring the industry.
And, in a broader plea to his fellow committee members, Mr Carrigy underlined comments made by Fianna Fáil TD Séamus McGrath over the need for a universal political approach going forwards.
'Working together, we will make changes,' he stressed.
'This is the biggest issue we have in our country at the minute. I agree with the comments of Deputy McGrath that we leave politics at the door and work together to tease out issues, hold accountable those who need to be held accountable, and try to make the changes that we need to improve housing output.'
Those calls comes amid fresh forecasts that show Ireland will struggle to even deliver the same number of homes built last year.
Commencement notices, a metric in many housing forecasts, are down 61pc in the first quarter of this year.
Data from the Central Statistics Office shows 5,938 new homes were completed in the first three months of this year, a 2pc increase on the same period last year and a trajectory that is unlikely to see overall targets reached by December.
Those challenges are ones which are mirrored by last month's new record high for homelessness figures.
The latest Department of Housing figures showed there were 10,743 adults and 4,675 children in emergency accommodation, including 2,212 families.
The overall number of people who are homeless is, however, thought to be much higher given that monthly figures do not include people sleeping on the streets, couch-surfing or those who access accommodation in domestic violence refuges or Direct Provision.
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