500 signatures reached
To: The Irish Government & Housing Minister Darragh O'Brien TD
Establish an Irish State Construction Company Now
The Government should immediately create a state construction company to build and retrofit homes across the country and provide affordable residential housing on the scale required to address the Irish housing crisis.
Why is this important?
1. A State construction company would divert scarce skilled construction labour to building projects where it is urgently required.
In the midst of a national housing crisis, just over a quarter (26.6%) of Irish construction workers are actually building residential homes. Many are building hotels and offices.
2. We cannot rely on the private sector to provide affordable housing and social housing because this does not align with the business interests of ‘for-profit’ private housing developers.
3. A State construction company would attract more young people toward pursuing a career in construction by offering quality permanent employment and better pay and working conditions.
There is currently a shortage of skilled construction workers, we urgently need to attract more young people to pursue a career in construction in order to meet Housing for All building targets.
4. Statistics show it is considerably cheaper for local authorities to directly build social and affordable houses than to buy completed units from private for-profit developers.