LDA proof positive FF FG learnt nothing from disastrous mistakes of the past
People Before Profit TD Richard Boyd Barrett has said that the government’s claim that housing is their number one priority “rings utterly hollow” as it is in fact the policies of successive Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael governments that have led to the disastrous housing crisis and the domination of the sector by vulture funds, cuckoo funds and speculators.
Deputy Boyd Barrett also pointed to the LDA legislation, which will open up the public land bank to private investors, as “proof positive that the government have learnt nothing from the disastrous mistakes of the past.”
The TD also pointed to some practical measures that could help turn the tide on the housing crisis.
He said: “The suggestion from Taoiseach Micheál Martin that the government have learnt any lessons from the disastrous decision to invite vulture and cuckoo funds into the Irish housing sector in 2013/2014, encouraging them with tax incentives and allowing them to buy up more than 40 billion worth of NAMA assets rings utterly hollow. It is precisely these policies and the wider government strategy on housing which has led to the crisis we have been dealing with for years.
“The Land Development Agency is proof positive that the government have learnt nothing from the mistakes of the past.
“It is bad enough that vulture and cuckoo funds now control the private housing sector, but with the LDA the government now plan on opening up the entire public land bank to the same private for profit interests that have done such damage to the whole housing sector and created the current crisis.
“What we need to begin to alleviate the crisis in housing is for private finance to be completely excluded from any involvement with the public land bank. We also need to shift radically to a major programme of public and genuinely affordable housing construction on the public land bank. We also need aggressive measures to take back control of hoarded building land and vacant properties through the use of positive anti-speculation tax measures and the aggressive use of CPOs.
“We need a dramatic change of direction on housing policy, not tinkering around the edges.”