Call made in Waterford for new housing approach
Councillor Conor McGuinness said a new approach to housing provision is needed.
Sinn Féin Councillor and General Election candidate, Conor D McGuinness, has said bad Government policy is the reason house prices continue to spiral out of control and that a new approach is needed but a change of Government is required for it to happen.
The Waterford Councillor's comments were made as the latest CSO property price index showed house prices in the South East surged upwards by more than 8 per cent in the year to August, while the median price of a new house in Dungarvan reached €477,500 - an increase of 13 per cent in one year.
“The Government’s housing plan is failing," he said, adding that "bad Government policy" was driving up private house prices and failing to deliver "anything close to enough genuinely affordable homes".
"A generation is stuck paying sky high rents while home ownership slips ever further away," he said.
"Sinn Féin has set out a clear alternative in our housing plan, 'A Home Of Your Own'," he added.
He went on to comment: “In Government, we would deliver tens of thousands of genuinely affordable homes at prices from €250,000, through Local Authorities and Approved Housing Bodies, while also activating the private residential development sector to deliver more private homes to purchase at more moderated prices."
He said the Government was dashing the hopes of thousands of people desperate to put an affordable roof over their heads.
"It is time for a new approach which can only be delivered with a change of Government," he said.
