Some workers in Laois denied social housing says election candidate

THE Independent Republican general election candidate and outgoing TD in Laois Brian Stanley said the government is failing workers who are trapped with their income just above the threshold for social housing.

He said this week he had spoken to a couple with four children living in a mobile home, “who have no hope of getting on to the social housing waiting list as their joint income of €43,000 is just over the income for social housing. The flip side of this is that all attempts by them to get a mortgage or council loan has failed due to their income being too low.”

“Over the past couple of years,” said Deputy Stanley, “I am coming across numerous families trapped in this situation. In most cases they are caught in private rented accommodation with no security of tenure and paying sky rocketing rents. The housing needs of these families are not being met at the moment. Families who are on incomes in the range of €40,000 – €60,000 are in the squeezed middle and who are under the most pressure.’’ 

He said: “The Government’s Affordable to Purchase Scheme and Affordable Cost Rentals is not being delivered at the scale required to meet the crisis. In 2023, according to the department housing figures, just 97 were delivered across the state in cost rentals with just six of these in Laois. Under the Affordable to Purchase Scheme 499 houses were delivered across the state with only eight of these in county. While Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael promised thousands the reality on the ground is we have snail pace delivery.’’

“The failure to address the predicament that thousands of families are caught in across Laois in private rented accommodation, living on the edge not knowing when they are going to get a notice to quit or yet another increase in rent needs to be addressed as a matter of urgency by the new government.

“The new incoming government must scale up the Affordable to Buy housing schemes and in parallel with this roll out the cost rental home schemes for those who will never qualify for a mortgage or local authority loan. They also need to introduce a 3 year freeze for those in private rented accommodation,” said the Portlaoise based TD