Labour: No confidence in Housing Minister

LABOUR will vote against the Government if a motion of no-confidence in Housing Minister Eoghan Murphy is tabled when the Dáil returns.

Last month a record of almost 10,000 people were homeless, including 3,755 children, with Taoiseach Leo Varadkar finally admitting the situation had become an ‘emergency’.

Sinn Féin is pondering a no-confidence motion in Minister Murphy, and yesterday the Labour housing spokeswoman Jan O’Sullivan said her party would have no choice but to support such a move.

‘We don’t have confidence in the Government with regard to housing. I wouldn’t pin it totally on Eoghan Murphy but we would support a motion should it arise,’ she said.

‘We’re not tabling one ourselves because we think that this is an issue for the whole of Government. Obviously, Eoghan Murphy is only in the job relatively recently but both he and his predecessor have completely failed to inject any sense of urgency around dealing with the housing crisis.’

Ms O’Sullivan criticised the Government’s track record on homelessness, which has soared by 81% since Fine Gael took office in 2011, according to figures from the Simon Community. She said: ‘There are many things that could be done a lot more quickly, like rapid build as one very simple example. They haven’t reached any of their deadlines.

‘They didn’t reach their deadline with regard to getting families out of hotels, they haven’t reached their construction deadline, and indeed in Dublin the crisis is at its worst.’

Labour is set to table a new rent certainty Bill in the coming weeks, which Ms O’Sullivan says would bring the country more in line with European norms.

She pointed to the fact that the average income has risen by just 8% since 2012, while the average rent has increased by 60%.

The measures in the Bill include limiting the cost of deposits to one month’s rent, linking rent increases to the Consumer Price Index, creating a register of rent prices, and making the entire country a rent pressure zone.

The Government has repeatedly refused to introduce such measures as it doesn’t want to interfere with the market, but Labour believes that is a failed policy as ‘the market is just not doing what it is supposed to do’.

Ms O’Sullivan also branded Government claims that such controls would cause landlords to pull properties from the market as ‘scaremongering’. A major cross-party march against homelessness is set to take place this Saturday in Dublin to ramp up the pressure on the Government.