Ireland's housing perma-crisis returns to centre of political agenda
The seeming perma-crisis of
housing
and the Government's struggle to tackle the problem is once more front and centre of the political agenda.
On Monday, left-wing Opposition parties –
Sinn Féin
,
Labour
, the
Social Democrats
and
People Before Profit
- announced plans for a major 'Raise the Roof' housing protest outside Leinster House next month to coincide with the tabling of a joint motion on the housing crisis.
Sinn Féin's Eoin Ó Broin said: 'We want the largest number of people who are angry and frustrated in the first instance with the Government's failures on housing … to come out, stand up to the Government and show your demand for something different.'
People Before Profit TD
Paul Murphy
called for 'a massive show of people power', saying: 'We need to declare a housing emergency.'
READ MORE
It remains to be seen what bright ideas will be included in the Opposition's motion – they will not be unveiling its contents until closer to the time – but it is clear they intend to ramp up pressure on the Government on housing both inside and outside Leinster House.
So what is the Government – which insists housing is its number one priority - doing about it all?
Minister for Housing
James Browne
has had something of a baptism of fire in his new role but he and his officials have been working on a range of housing activation measures due to be announced in the coming weeks.
The first is due to go before Cabinet today.
Developers would be able to seek
extensions to planning permissions
in cases where building work has been delayed by judicial review proceedings, under the plans for emergency legislation set to be considered by Ministers today.
The intention is for the legislation to be completed prior to the Dáil summer recess and there is a hope within Government that it could help to get thousands of units built.
The measure is a bid to activate developments such as large-scale apartment projects which might otherwise go beyond their permission timeline after being held up as a result of judicial reviews sought by opponents of the planned developments.
Another intervention is efforts to regulate
AirBnB
-style short-term lets amid a hope that potentially thousands of homes could be freed up for the long-term rental market.
As Jack Horgan-Jones reports today
, there were other considerations in developing that policy too, as officials warned that failure to regulate short-term lettings could lead to protests against tourism, undermining the 'Irish welcome' and damaging the attractiveness of Ireland as a destination.
Separately, there are ongoing deliberations over the future of Rent Pressure Zones (RPZs) – where two per cent caps on rent increases are aimed at protecting tenants from large hikes.
However, the system has fuelled concern that private investment in housing is being stifled and is impacting on supply.
The Opposition are poised to oppose any outcome of this review that in their view leads to rent increases.
At the weekend, Minister of State for Housing John Cummins said there are a 'range of options' under consideration in relation to RPZs.
He told RTÉ: 'We want to ensure that we have protections in place for renters while also increasing supply. I think we can find a balance between both.'
Finding this balance is likely to prove tricky.
Ultimately the Coalition has pledged to introduce a new 'all of Government national housing plan' that will see construction capacity ramped up to build more than 300,000 new homes by the end of 2030.
Another story today by Niamh Towey shows how reaching that target will prove difficult.
The
Economic and Social Research Institute
(ESRI) is due to tell the Oireachtas committee on housing that
there will be no major uptick in housing supply
this year or next year.
While the ESRI is currently forecasting just over 34,000 new homes will be built this year and 37,000 in 2026, 'most of the risks weigh on the downside', researcher Conor O'Toole will tell TDs and Senators.
The latest housing targets set by the Government aim for a total of 303,000 new homes to be built by 2030, starting with 41,000 homes this year and rising incrementally to 60,000 homes a year by 2030.
A total of 30,330 homes were built in 2024, a decrease from 33,000 in 2023, which the ESRI points to as a 'notable weakness'.
Best Reads
Today's lead outlines how a consultant working at
Children's Health Ireland
(CHI) who was at the centre of an internal review for allegedly referring public patients to his own weekend clinic did not face disciplinary action. The consultant instead retired, after the investigation highlighted issues around governance and adherence to correct procedures in a children's hospital. Our Health Correspondent Shauna Bowers has the story
here
.
The parties' selection of candidates for the upcoming presidential election is becoming a late late show,
Harry McGee writes
.
Political Editor Pat Leahy
outlines
how Minister for Arts and Culture
Patrick O'Donovan
will seek funding to 'extend and expand' the
basic income scheme for artists
, which is due to expire this summer. A pilot scheme, under which 2,000 artists have been paid €325 a week, has been operating for the last three years but is due to conclude in August.
On the opinion pages
Fintan O'Toole asks
: if there's so much buyer's remorse about Brexit, why is Nigel Farage the rising figure in UK politics?
Playbook
The Cabinet is meeting this morning. Here is our
tee-up story
about what is set to be discussed by Ministers, including the drafting of legislation prohibiting the importation of goods from illegal settlements in the Occupied Palestinian Territories.
Proceedings in the Dáil kick off with Leaders' Questions at 2pm.
At 3.50pm Minister for Justice Jim O'Callaghan is expected to make a public apology on behalf of the State to the family of Shane O'Farrell, who died after being knocked off his bicycle in Co Monaghan in 2011 by a man with multiple convictions.
From 6.10pm onwards the Dáil will debate a proposed Sinn Féin Bill to stop the sale of Israeli bonds through the Irish Central Bank.
Tánaiste and Minister for Foreign Affairs Simon Harris will take Parliamentary Questions at 8.10pm.
TDs will have an opportunity to raise 'Topical Issues' at 9.46pm.
Government business in the Seanad includes statements on the Local Democracy Taskforce.
A range of Oireachtas committees will be electing their Leas-Chathaoirleach and meeting in private session.
The committee on foreign affairs will hear from Minister of State for international development and diaspora Neale Richmond at 3pm.
The Central Bank and ESRI will be before the committee on housing, also at 3pm.
The full schedule for the Dáil, Seanad and committees can be found here:
https://www.oireachtas.ie/en/detailed-schedule/?tab=dail
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Irish Times
32 minutes ago
- Irish Times
Suggestions for solving the housing crisis
Sir, – Building on Pat Leahy's excellent observation that the Government's response to the housing crisis is barely at the mildly urgent level ( 'Housing emergency? Ireland is not even acting at the level of mildly urgent' , June 2nd), may I suggest a suitable response that addresses the supply side issues currently faced? 1) All Ministers, civil servants, planners, and local authority heads involved in the planning process and the delivery of critical infrastructure such as water and electricity – as well as TDs, Senators and local councillors who make representations on behalf of objectors in their constituency, members of the judiciary who make planning decisions, serial objectors and owners of derelict properties – to be made homeless and put on the housing waiting list. 2) Keep the above on the waiting list until the housing crisis is marked as 'solved'. Perhaps this might focus minds accordingly. All without the need to offer someone ¤450,000 per annum. – Yours, etc, READ MORE RORY J WHELAN, Drogheda, Co Meath.
Irish Times
4 hours ago
- Irish Times
Only the introduction of Tina's maiden name could stir a response from ‘monster' Richard Satchwell
'My name is Sarah Howard. I am Tina Dingivan's niece.' Richard Satchwell , the man about to be sentenced to life for Tina's murder, moved his head up, ever so slightly, when her name was spoken. Throughout the trial, the woman he killed, his wife, was referred to as Tina Satchwell. His name. Sarah finished reading her victim impact statement. READ MORE If it made any impact, he certainly didn't show it. He never once looked at her. But she made sure to look at him as she passed by the dock, an expression of disgust on her face. Next up. 'My name is Lorraine Howard. I am Tina Dingivan's sister.' Again, just a tiny movement of the head at the mention of that name. Lorraine finished reading her victim impact statement. Satchwell, motionless, eyes cast down, ignored her too. It was only the pointed use of Tina's family name which seemed to stir some flickers of awareness. Lorraine Howard said Richard Satchwell 'stole' precious time she would have had with her sister, Tina (pictured). Photograph: Irish Examiner Both women called him out for the cruel, manipulative 'monster' he really is. They described how he continued to torture them with public outpourings of his love for his 'missing' wife after he killed her and hid the body. They told him how his need to have 'ultimate control' over Tina led to her violent death and a lifetime of pain for her grieving family. Sarah and Lorraine may as well have been talking to the wall. Minutes later, Satchwell's lawyer would confirm to the court that he intends to appeal his conviction. He believes he didn't murder Tina. A jury of his peers agreed unanimously that he did. He couldn't control them. And what Tina's sister and niece did from the witness stand in court number six on Wednesday was something he can never control either – they gave her back her name, the one she had before she met him, reintroducing the woman they knew before his malign influence infested her life. He believes he didn't murder his wife, Tina Satchwell. She belonged to him. He loves her. But, as the court case revealed, and her sister and niece confirmed, he couldn't allow a life for Tina Dingivan. When her maiden name was so deliberately introduced – no mention of his, it was a simple, but very powerful gesture by her family. Richard Satchwell holding a photo of his missing wife Tina at their home in Youghal, Co Cork. Photograph: Irish Examiner And perhaps, with those slight flickers of recognition, Richard Satchwell knows that too. There was little surprise in court when Judge Paul McDermott was told that the English-born, Cork-based lorry driver intends to fight on. He thinks he should not have been found guilty of murdering his wife and dumping her body in a chest freezer before entombing her in a concrete grave under the stairs in their home and then contacting her niece to offer her the empty freezer. Always thinking of others. Gardaí and Fr Bill Bermingham after human remains are found following the search of Richatd and Tina Satchwell's home in Youghal, Co Cork. Photograph: Michael Mac Sweeney/Provision 'To think I could have taken that into my family home and used it. I mean, what kind of person can do that?' said Sarah, in disbelief. But the theatrically loving husband believes he should not be sent down for life because 'he never intended to kill her', said defence counsel Brendan Grehan, acting under instruction from his client. Furthermore, counsel said, Satchwell wanted it to be known that 'despite anything that was said in this trial, Tina was a lovely person'. You could hear people catch their breath in the back rows, where Tina's family and friends were seated. Satchwell's self-centred delusion still had the capacity to surprise after a five week trial. 'It's not right,' a woman in the public gallery loudly whispered as the court rose and the prisoner quickly exited, head down, looking at nobody. 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Irish Times
5 hours ago
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Death row survivor Sonia ‘Sunny' Jacobs found ‘tranquility' in Connemara before death in house fire
Sonia 'Sunny' Jacobs and her husband Peter Pringle lived out their lives in a place of breathtaking beauty and isolation. Each morning when they opened their curtains they had views of the blue-tinged Twelve Pins mountain range , rocky bogland and Lough Glenicmurrin. The 1970s-era bungalow where Ms Jacobs (76) and her caretaker Kevin Kelly (31) died in a house fire in the early hours of Tuesday morning is down a rough boreen. The area is now closed off with Garda tape. It seems scarcely believable that a woman who overcame so much in her life would succumb to the tragedy of a house fire along with a young man who had his whole life ahead of him. READ MORE [ Woman who died in Connemara house fire named as former US death row inmate Sunny Jacobs Opens in new window ] Sonny Jacobs pictured at the Cuirt International Festival of Literature in 2007. Photograph: Joe O'Shaughnessy. Ms Jacobs spent five years on death row in Florida and 16 years in prison for a murder she did not commit. While she was in prison, her parents, who were looking after her two children, were killed in a plane crash. She was released in 1992. Six years later, at a meeting organised by Amnesty International in Galway, she met Peter Pringle. He had also been on death row in Ireland for the murder of gardaí John Morley and Henry Byrne in July 1980. He too was exonerated having spent 14 years in jail. They moved twice in Connemara before settling in Glenicmurrin at the end of a row of about a dozen houses. The nearest town, Costelloe, is 15 minutes drive away. Despite their isolation, they regularly received visitors mostly in connection with the Sunny Centre, which she set up with Mr Pringle to campaign against the death penalty worldwide. Mr Pringle died in December 2023 and Ms Jacobs's beloved dog, Barney, died a short time after that. Postman Michael Leainde got to know the couple better than most. 'People are really shocked and it is only now they are coming to grips with what happened,' he said. 'She was very witty. I'd be talking to her every second day. If I said something and she didn't think it was right, she would say, 'Michael, you were wrong about that'. She was a great woman and we had great chats,' he said. Postman Michael Leainde got to know the couple better than most. Photograph: Ronan McGreevy He thought she and her husband found a happiness in the landscape of Connemara that had denied to them for so long in their lives. 'If you look around you, you have peace and tranquillity. When you get a little bit older in age, you want to have some peace in life. They really appreciated what they had here,' she said. Mr Leainde, who is also a local councillor, spoke to her last Thursday and said she was in great form. She had spoken to her son recently via video call, he recalled. A neighbour, Michael Walsh, said he knew her husband Mr Pringle very well and he would call in occasionally. They were a happy couple who moved to the location in their final years to the house their final location locally having rented an adjacent house for many years. She was a 'nice woman. We all felt sorry for her for all the years she spent in prison', he said. Ruairí McKiernan, a former member of the Council of State, a body that advises the president of Ireland, first met Ms Jacobs 18 years ago and they became good friends. Despite being 76, she worked until the end of her life talking, podcasting and advocating for the Sunny Foundation in the United States, he said in an online tribute. 'She never stopped giving, and, in all of this, she kept gratitude at the heart of her practice. Always grateful for beauty, for animals, for nature, for friendship, for life,' he said.
