News

The SHD process has been a success at only one thing – boosting the value of developers’ sites, not housing stock Planning laws have become a developers’ charter thanks to the intervention of successive Ministers, according to Social Democrats co-leader Róisin Shortall, who has published legislation to restore quality and democracy to the planning process. […]

The Social Democrats today committed to a national Youth Homeless Strategy to make sure that young people are no longer left behind in the homeless crisis. The party’s political director and by-election candidate for Dublin Mid-West, Anne-Marie McNally said: “Young people are being severely impacted by the appalling homeless crisis with the number of homeless […]

It is an affront to our very values that we have a situation where so many children and families do not have a place to call home, but are instead living in hotels, B&Bs and so-called family hubs. Commenting on the latest homelessness figures, Social Democrats co-leader Catherine Murphy TD said: “For the seventh month […]

Social Democrats co-leader Catherine Murphy TD has said the latest increase in homeless people is a scandal, with children accounting for more than one in three of those living in emergency accommodation. Deputy Murphy said: “The latest official homeless figures are a scandal and the Fine Gael Government is simply incapable of dealing with the […]

Social Democrats Political Director and Spokeswoman on Consumer Affairs, Anne-Marie McNally, today called for urgent measures to curb runaway prices for new and refurbished rental properties. “People trying to secure new or refurbished rental properties are now being hit with intolerable rent hikes, with today’s figures from the Residential Tenancies Board showing rents for new […]

Social Democrats co-leader Catherine Murphy TD has called on the government to come clean on the number of people who are homeless amid concerns about the re-categorisation of figures in the latest official statistics. “Cutting the official figures does nothing to help those people who are living in emergency accommodation that is either owned or […]

Social Democrats co-leader Róisín Shortall TD today called on the Minister for Health to intervene to compel the HSE to release smear slides to women affected by the CervicalCheck controversy so they can be independently reviewed. “The effect of trapping long-term renters in high rents is that the mortgage rules are actually inflating the rental […]

The Social Democrats today set out the party’s priorities for the new Dáil term, calling for a nationwide freeze on rents at current levels to stem the flow of low-and-middle income earners into homelessness. “The Government needs to intervene now to stop rents sky-rocketing any further. We have to end this exploitation of renters and […]

Social Democrats Political Director and Consumer Affairs spokesperson Anne-Marie McNally has asked what planet Minister Eoghan Murphy lives on if he believes that €320,000 constitutes an affordable home. “It’s bad enough that Fine Gael propose to effectively give away vast chunks of state land to private developers, but then asking people to pay €320,000 for a […]

The Social Democrats have described the government’s new Land Development Agency as an inadequate and unambitious response to the housing crisis. “There has been an urgent and obvious need for a development agency to coordinate the acquisition of land and the building of houses that are affordable to buy or rent. However, what’s being proposed […]