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CHARITIES WORKING IN the housing and homelessness sector have sharply criticised the Government for doing too little on housing in Budget 2025.
The Simon Communities’ executive director Wayne Stanley said it was “extraordinary” that so much money could be spent and “so little done for those at the sharpest end of the housing crisis”.
He said the 10,000 social homes promised in the budget was “simply insufficient” as a target.
“We see another budget where the rhetoric of homelessness being a ‘top priority’ is not in evidence,” he said.
Focus Ireland Director of Advocacy Mike Allen: “The housing measures continued to focus on helping people deal with the cost of housing failure rather than tackle the failure itself.”
He said measures to invest in the Land Development Agency, in his view, represent that the Government are moving away is focus from social housing in favour of affordable housing instead.
He reasoned that this measure would not benefit those who are currently homeless. He added:
“The problem with a give-away budget is that what it gives away is the resources we need to provide lasting solutions.”
Sinn Féin TD and party finance spokesperson Pearse Doherty said, in response to the Budget in the Dáil today: “This is not a giveaway budget. This is a give-up-on-housing budget.”
He said that the Government were “raising the white flag” on housing by not committing a “single social or affordable house more” to its targets.
He said that it was “shocking” for Government not to increase its targets and claimed it was insulting to those in need of a home.
Threshold, a homelessness prevention charity, expressed concern at a lack of additional funding to boost the amounts available through the Housing Assistance Payments scheme.
While it welcomed the measures that were included in the budget, it said the Government could’ve gone further.
These social housing welfare payments were surpassed by rents in the private sector “many years ago”, leaving HAP recipients “often having to make up the shortfall with money they do not have”, Threshold said.
It added that an additional 8,400 people may need to avail of HAP in 2025.
DePaul also cautiously welcomed the proposals but said it was “disappointed at the lack of any significant increase in the commitment to meet the Housing Commissions call for an increase of 20% in low cost housing”.
The Journal put these criticisms from housing charities to the Minister for Housing Darragh O’Brien at a press conference earlier today.
The Minister said he had “immense regard and respect” for the NGOs and charities who help to prevent homelessness in Ireland and accepted that there was still more than needed to be done to help those facing homelessness.
He pointed to figures from the second quarter of this year indicating 630 families exited emergency accommodation. He said that he expects Government to reach its social housing targets and exceed affordable housing targets this year.
He added: “Major challenges to remain – I’ve been very honest with people. And Simon [Communities] will know that, and the [other] NGOs know that too. But we’ve been able to make real progress over the last few years working with our NGO partners.”
Included in the housing measures in Budget 2025, the Help-To-Buy scheme was extended until 2029 after it was due to conclude at the end of next year. Rent tax credits were increased to €1,000 per tenant andwill be back dated to this year.
A new, third rate of stamp duty, applicable to residential property valued above €1.5 million, will be set at 6% with effect from midnight tonight. The existing rate of 1% will continue to apply to homes valued up to €1 million, and 2% on values over €1 million.
A higher rate of stamp duty on bulk purchasing of houses also increased from 10% to 15%, with immediate effect. There was also an increase to the vacant homes tax where property owners will now have to pay seven-times the local property tax rate.
Additional reporting by Christina Finn
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It’s not coming up at the doors because abortion is considered a settled matter by the vast majority of the country, we voted to stop restricting women’s healthcare.
Aontú are really a one-issue party, they were formed purely on the abortion issue and its their number one priority above all else.
One trick party’s are a danger to a country just look at the UK with UKIP and Brexit…they got what they wanted and it hurt people and then they didn’t know what else to do.
@Martin Bishop: No surprise, he ignored Sinn Féin members voting to support legislation for abortion for two years and then left whem he realised that he couldn’t change it so ignoring the consensus of support by the vast majority in the Republic is no great surprise.
@William Slevin: If you know of anyone who might have committed a murder, you should be reporting this to the Gardaí.
@William Slevin: Hopefully this country will never take the backward step you wish for. A step which allowed Savita Halappanavar to die needlessly.Your opinion is your opinion but do not force your beliefs onto others. Ireland has had to put up with enough of this clergy enforced rubbish to last an eternity.
@William Slevin: Don’t trust the electorate to get it right? Typical BS from you. Irish people voted overwhelmingly to allow abortion, ye lost BADLY and never stopped moaning. You love talking down to people, a perfect match to Peadar
@Martin Bishop: Well it is very evident to me that you are not well read in Dail reports or the happening in the Dail every day. Toibin is the one TD that holds the Government to account every time . He , along with some very good Independents are the real opposition. Toibin is by a mile the best speaker and worker in the Dail.
@William Slevin: William, neither you nor I will ever face the personal decision of whether to have an abortion. That choice belongs solely to the woman. While it takes two to create a pregnancy, it is the woman who bears the physical and emotional weight, and ultimately, the responsibility of deciding what’s best for her.
I am, and always will be, pro-choice because I believe in respecting women’s right to decide for themselves. They have the right to choose whether to continue a pregnancy or seek an abortion, and that decision deserves our respect, even if it differs from our personal
@William Slevin: can we start rising children under trees if can afford cost of feeding them… ..
@William Slevin: Back in your box little Willy, you are an opinionated Old Testament type, no one wants to hear your warblings you frustrated old melt.
@William Slevin: man’s issues dooo
@Gerry Lamont: she died of sepsis, it’s officially declared on a HSE report
@William Slevin: No matter what you think, abortion is not murder. End of.
@William Slevin: actually 33.4% of the population did NOT vote against abortion, nice attempt to inflate the number though.
@William Slevin: hopefully with modern birth control u might not get pregnant William
@William Slevin: some man to pontificate over ‘trusting the electorate’ when you are moaning about the will of 68% of the people.
@Richard Hennessy:
Nobody should get pregnant these days if they don’t want to. There are numerous options for contraception, abortion shouldn’t be one of them.
@Paul Fahey:
It was 33.1%. Do you really think anyone would try to inflate the number by 0.3% ?
@brendan hackett:
100% of aborted babies disagree…
@Tired Jim: it’s a well documented fact she asked for a termination,was refused,sepsis then set in from which she died
This saddens me, Eimer Tobin does absolutely sterling work in my area on the issue of public transport, with which we are having massive problems. However, I cannot give my vote to her because it just doesn’t align with my own thoughts on abortion. I absolutely do not have the right to tell another woman how many children she should have and, if she should bear a child with a severe physical disability which is going to impact greatly on her life and, the life of her existing children.
@Fiona Wyse: we say how the lady in America as a one trick pony got on.
@Fiona Wyse: Sounds like something Hitler would say when you talk about disabled children. The WOKE left in this country are really terrifying at times the way they speak.
@Fiona Wyse:
Nobody is telling anyone how many children to have. Have you never heard of contraception?
@Adam H2022: Lol! *dont tred on me* but like do what i say
@Fiona Wyse: we’ll said Fiona,we now have 20,000 babies exterminations a year,let’s try and increase this to 30.000
@Adam H2022: there are no disability or respite for families or support for carers on this county. If you want to help disabled children so much or judge woman who v make decisions for their habits, maybe make the life of families with disabled coldhearted bearable and not punish them with means tested carers allowance, no respite or services for their disabled child?
Oh man, launching the BIG MANIFESTO without actually having said manifesto to hand / printed——– OOCH!!!
@Frank Mc Carthy: a fairly schoolboy error alright. Obviously, Peader was impressive & on the money for those ill thought out badly worded referendums earlier this year & he did well in that ’10 peader’ debate last week but, all in all, shouldn’t every party have their manifesto out there long before 8 days to the polling booth???
@Kevvy kerrr: ’10 LEADER’ debate, damn predictive text
How can Aontu and leader Peadar Tobin
be trusted on any of the big issues facing the country when they refuse to accept the result of the referendum held in 2018 when the majority of the people voted to amend the constitution on abortion.
In an Trump like move, Peadar has stated that if elected he will push to introduce amendments to the current legislation on abortion in an effort to undermine the will of the majority of the people.
Regardless of Aontu policy on all other issues, the very fact that their party aim to overrun the referendum held in 2018 should trigger a warning light in the minds of the electorate.
@Chaotic State: he doesn’t have to agree with the results of a referendum and is perfectly entitled to try to get his views into law using democratic means. That’s what voting is all about .
@Chaotic State:The factors that influenced a yes vote in 2018 were the commitment to a three day wait period a twelve week limit. Aren’t those parties and candidates who are now proposing to abolish those also rejecting the will of the people.
@William Slevin: You are writing through the rear end of you a_us. Accept the democratic rights of others and move on. You and your Trump crew are the most undemocratic bunch of i__ots!
@Con Cussed: Do you respect the fact that Trump won the US presidential election? It sounds like you don’t.
Another pro-life shinner. Is irony dead?
1 TD, 8 councillors, no MEPs and 2000 members in the 32 counties. Barely counts as a party yet he is never off the airwaves or the telly. There are bigger groupings in the Dail that get virtually no coverage.
@Dermot Blaine: I see that Aontú’s website refers to ‘the south of Ireland’ and ‘the north of Ireland’ – Peadar must forget that he quit the ‘Republican Movement’ at times.
@Brendan O’Brien: Dah! He’s factually correct!
@K O: Malin Head is in the south?
@K O: it’s Ireland and Northern Ireland
@Sara McSweeney: Shinners won’t use the term Northern Ireland.
@K O: Yes, always greatly amused me that the furthest part of the ‘south’ that is north is further north that the furthest part of the ‘north’ is north.
Maybe ‘Northern Ireland’ should have been called ‘North Eastern Ireland’ for clarity.
@Brendan O’Brien: but thats what the majority of people of people say Northern Ireland Southern Ireland
@Sheila McNulty: That’s not what Aontú say.
@Brendan O’Brien: Aontù is a republican party.
@Sara McSweeney: The north of Ireland is part of Ireland.
@Sara McSweeney: will be nord of Ireland’s soo ssoon…
Becouse
thushnamies coming from afriko or asia etc…
Also 7 or 10mill not much diff as
stiilll we too small toobe divided against orange and apples…by from scenarios of top of 0000.1oldmuney
@William Slevin: I didn’t say anything to you, I pointed out that Aontu are barely a political party in my comment, not aimed at anyone in particular. Not sure what comment I’m meant to have on copy and paste
@A W: So you failed English in the Leaving Cert I presume. I’ve heard a better standard of English being spoken in tents along the canal than this drivel you’re spewing.
@Sheila McNulty: no, only people from Northern Ireland refer to Ireland as ‘Southern Ireland’
I raised the abortion stance with him when he called to my door on Tuesday afternoon so I’m disappointed to hear that statement. It is the main reason that I won’t vote for his party.
Not terrible, but I wish that Toibin would have taken a stronger stance on stopping parties who are running for election like Labour and Fine Gael from introducing abortion up until birth as well as repealing the nasty 12-week legislation. For too long, the Irish people have been tricked into believing that abortions are harmless because the vocabulary has been changed sneakily (unborn child to foetus, partial-birth abortion to late-term abortion etc.) and those who claim to be “pro-choice” don’t want a woman to have the right to know just what they are choosing. FG and FF keep blocking legislation to allow doctors to show women exactly what an abortion looks like. Even still photographs of aborted babies have been banned as well. They want to control the discourse and normalise abortion.
@Frank O’Hara: Is that you, William?
Can you provide a source for “introducing abortion up until birth” ?
A foetus is the medical term for an unborn baby, starting at the 11th week.
What’s your problem with using a correct, scientific language?
Unless, you think people are in general too “slow” to know – but, then they shouldn’t be able to vote at all, correct?
@Wolfgang Bonow: William who? Numerous Labour, Social Democrat, Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael politicians have stated that they support legalising abortion up until birth by removing all limits. In fact, Labour and the Social Democrats went a step further and have even openly included it in their manifestos. Life begins at conception, it is an unborn child, not a foetus. That’s why when you murder a pregnant woman, you are charged with double murder. Do you know why doctors don’t remove the baby completely when dismembering the body in a partial-birth abortion? They would be charged with murder if they did because the baby can survive outside the womb. Abortion is barbaric, it involves severing limbs of the unborn child and sucking the baby’s brains out via tubes inserted into the womb.
@Frank O’Hara:
Shhhh… Don’t tell people what abortion actually involves, you need to refer to babies as clumps of cells or something also.
Abortion is a settled matter for the vast majority of the electorate who voted in a relatively recent referendum to liberalise the law subject to certain safeguards.The so-called review of the legislation, carried out by an abortion advocate and pal of Minister for People Sleeping on the Streets, O Gorman, is DOA, having failed to achieve a consensus of TDs to implement its predictable and one- sided recommendations.
For this very reason I won’t be voting any of the one trick pony minority parties or independents, we will have a coalition with two of the big three, SF FF FG, take your pick of two of them
Euthanasia is next thing coming, he should get out ahead of the other parties by being pro euthanasia/right to die
@P. V. Aglue: nah, he’d rather people suffer against their will I’d say.
LIfe…….at any cost.
@Martin Bishop:
Like a baby being aborted suffers against their will ?
Publicans don’t care how smashed out of your head you are, as long as you can stagger up to the bar and open your wallet, they’ll keep pulling the pints, drinking at home is much cheaper and less boring
It doesn’t come up because if you mention your view to the wrong person you will be looked upon as being right wing reactionary or left wing murderer.
Toibin believes women in crisis pregnancies choose abortion because they can’t afford to raise the child. Seriously he said that.
Extract fantasy from logic, palpable overbites in this party, have to be careful with religious zealotry.
The SF vs Aontu arguments here are a great spectator sport. That saying ‘narcissism of small differences’ springs to mind.
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