New homes helping with progress to ease pressure on demand for housing
The country’s dysfunctional housing market will be a pivot point for politics in the upcoming election.
Except for the fact that the political slogan “A lot done, More to do” was used in a previous political/election context — and has been widely ridiculed since — you could quite easily imagine some, or all, of the three main political parties yearning to wheel out the boast with the subtext that “we’re on the right road, bear with us” for whenever the next election is set, and for when housing will inevitably dominate the discourse.
The writing has been on the cards for quite a while that the country’s as-ever dysfunctional housing market will be a pivot point for politics, as much as for the wider and increasingly impatient populace.
Last election, it was housing, plus health were the hot topics. Neither issue/crisis has found a cure, but the next one is going to be housing once more, first and foremost, plus the cost-of-living crisis post-Ukraine invasion.
The temperature between now and whenever the election is called is going to be raised after Sinn Fein’s assertion earlier this month that holding the Housing portfolio is going to be a red line for them in any coalition government discussions: “Housing is absolutely core, it’s absolutely key,” signalled party leader Mary Lou McDonald.
The prospect will divide along expected political, class, economic and even age grounds, in the run up to an election, depending on where people are on the housing/ownership spectrum, whether young, otherwise shut out, or older, settled, otherwise housed and with skin and/or assets in the frame.
Getting the balance right, and not over-excite or scare the horses on either side will take some deft political positioning — and will need astute slogans for the outgoing coalition parties which reflect the achievements currently being delivered (albeit late in the day), while acknowledging the fact the housing issue has years to run to find a societal equilibrium.
There will be much pivoting around the figure of 30,000 housing units coming into play during 2023, up from a far lower sum of a few short years ago: supply has really ramped up.
However, it’s well short of the 40,000 to 50,000 units really and urgently needed to make inroads into needs across all tenure type. And, of course it’s only a fraction of the output the country managed in the mid 2000s (90,000 units, tipping 100,000 new builds for a brief period) as it careened into an over-delivery and banking crash.
What is certain is that repeating the Housing for All strategy’s 30k delivery figure, whether the year’s outturn is slightly over it or just under it, isn’t going to cut it with a vast swathe of the population.
Apart from political allegiances, shifting in many cases, many are rightly disaffected by sky-high rents, inordinate planning delays, skills shortages, increased interest rates, inadequate supply, and high purchase costs (the median price of homes bought in summer was €320,000).
Into the difficult fray is the imbalance starting to play out in the interchange between homes to rent, homes for the cost rental sector, for local authorities, for approved housing bodies (AHBs), for those being brought a bit belatedly on by the Land Development Agency and, contrasting with the once dominant, currently dwindling, sector of private homes to purchase.
The government parties will be trying to get the good news out about new housing initiatives they’ve introduced in the past 18 months (and the successes they are starting to see on the ground), as well as comments about a robust economy with stuffed State coffers, near full employment, and more ‘achievement’ boxes they’d like the electorate to appreciate.
Unfortunately for them, the period between now and the next general election will continue to be dominated by the housing negatives…population and immigration growth…risen interest rates to a new European Central Bank high after ten recent hikes since the launch of the euro… depressed international economies next door to us… a war on Europe’s borders, and the stubborn impact of a cost of living crisis which hits everyone’s pockets.
And that’s not to mention the state of the planet.
