Podcast 1st part

A group of students from Newton University discuss the housing crisis in Ireland. They focus on institutional landlords, immigration, refugees, and government policies. They question whether the government is doing enough to prevent the housing crisis. They highlight the rise of housing financialization and the increasing prices for houses in Dublin. They also mention discrimination faced by ethnic minorities and the lack of regulation in landlord tenant selection. They discuss the impact on families, the lifting of the eviction ban, and the migrant crisis in Ireland. They explain the reasons for migration and its impact on the housing situation. They suggest implementing a points-based system for immigration. They briefly touch on the focus on refugees and their role in the lack of available housing. I know you were probably expecting the voice of Eileen Dunne. Sorry to disappoint you, but hello everyone and welcome to our podcast on the housing crisis in Ireland. My name is Luke Goldman and with me today is Tommy Bowie, Kristina Mikov and Stephanie Obison. We are all students from Newton University in first year and our main focuses on our research are institutional landlords, immigration, refugees and government policies and regulations. Our main question today is, is the government doing enough to prevent the housing crisis in Ireland? First off, let's start with the housing market and the role institutional landlords have to play. We have heard so much about landlords in Ireland lately and everyone is seeing them as a problem, but I don't understand why. If you've not seen the news or haven't been keeping up with Twitter, the Leave Radcliffe has come out as a landlord, which makes perfect sense when it comes to some of the laws that have passed and why he was so adamant about protecting landlords and the dog. But let's not only look at him of course. I have not been keeping up with the Irish housing market lately. What is going on? Why are the prices for house so high recently? Without a doubt, housing financialization is high in Ireland. To translate, this is when housing is treated as a vehicle for investment rather than a social good, which is how we have come to see so many institutional landlords in Ireland and these landlords have large portfolios when it comes to their properties. Ireland has experienced a dramatic rise in the amount of housing in the private renting sector, going from 11% in 2002 to 98% in 2011, nearly double the amount of houses. To put this into perspective, there was 300,000 houses within the private rental sector in 2011 and it was only rising. We've seen through the disproportionate rise in the cost of housing in Dublin, but the main focus of these landlords is Dublin. There are some landlords in possession of over a thousand apartments and suites in Dublin, which stands to counter the fact that they can't set the prices in Dublin and they're only going to get higher. The government is not doing enough when it comes to the housing prices because these are trying times and there should be a cap on the prices for housing in Ireland and there should also be a ban on eviction. But does that not mean that if you do have enough money or the capability to rent in Dublin, won't you be able to get? No, even if you do have enough money or the capability to rent in Dublin, you will also face the challenge of discrimination. There was a case study in which they interviewed landlords in Roma and it showed that ethnic minorities in Ireland found it much harder to receive housing. Now there are a few landlords that openly said that they won't take on Roma when they went to save their properties. Now we know that not only hard is it for Irish citizens to receive housing in this current market due to financial reasons, but there is also discrimination and a lack of regulation when it comes to who landlords choose to take on as tenants, which is a huge cause for concern as there is a rising number of migrants coming into the country. On top of that we also have the Ukrainian refugees who are in need of shelter as a result of the war. There is a great demand for housing and the government is outlining people to access it. How are families affected by this? I'm glad you asked that because I recently read an article about housing for lone parents in Ireland and this article states that there was a halting of the construction of social housing between 2008 and 2013, which then of course leaves the dependency on the private rentless market, which is dominated by institutions and landlords, a.k.a. Labour. Recently the Irish government has lifted the eviction ban. The eviction ban was officially lifted on Saturday and ministers have insisted that if the ban is not ended it would have worse long-term effects than continuing it. This is from the Irish Times and shows that there is a huge bias for landlords within the Dáil. This lifting of the eviction ban has placed so many people and families at risk of eviction. Many people would not have anywhere to go, further increasing the number of people in homelessness. Next let's look at the migrant crisis. What is the person defined as a migrant and why is there such an uproar about migrants in Ireland? To begin with the definition of the word migration, it is the movement of people for different reasons across the borders of territorial entities in order to change their place of residence forever or for a certain period of time. It is quite noticeable nowadays that there is a strong migration flow within Europe and Ireland is not an exception. Ireland has a visible diversity in religion, race and ethnicity aspects due to a big amount of newcomers in it. According to the Central Statistics Office website the major part of migrants in Ireland consists of American, Polish, Romanian, UK nationals, Brazilian, Italian, Spanish, French and Latvian nationalities. So as far as can be seen, European migrants make up a large share of immigrants in Ireland because European membership allows citizens from European member states to live and work in Ireland without restriction. Currently the amount of migrants in the country is a bit more than 5 million people. What encourages such a big amount of people to migrate to our country? The reasons can be divided into two following groups, push factors and pull factors. The first one includes economic poverty and political insecurity which may be caused by war. For instance the war situation in Ukraine because of the Russian invasion that forced some Ukrainian refugees to come to Ireland. The pull factors are border openness of a country, working opportunities and cultural openness. A good example of that is migrants from European countries such as Poland, Latvia and others. These people come to Ireland as salaries in our country may be higher and in addition it is not problematic for European migrants to move because as it was noted before European membership allows them to live and to work without restriction here. Yes, Ireland is quite an appealing country for people to move into because of its economics, cultural openness, working opportunities, education etc. But as far as it can be seen there are some negative consequences for Irish citizens and even for migrants themselves. That is true. One of them and probably the most painful is the housing situation that is directly related to a growing number of people who are moving to Ireland. Besides the obvious and well-known correlation more people in a country less accommodation there is one more thing. Growing migration flow is a reason for the increasing demand for housing and thus housing prices as well. Due to that except for the fact that it becomes hard to find an accommodation it may also be just not affordable for both Irish citizens and people who are migrating here. Well, I think the situation with the migrant crisis in our country should be investigated. The housing crisis problem will be solved to a certain extent as well. The most effective and right thing government can do is to make some changes in immigration policy. Let's take as an example of what can be done a points-based system of letting migrants into the country. This system is used in the UK, Australia, Canada and New Zealand. So how this system works? The point system gives points to immigrants who have a combination of education, job skills, wealth, English proficiency and only immediate family connections. And these people are likely to get an opportunity to move to a country. While low-skilled, poorly educated, non-English speakers are predominantly denied in access and citizenship. That brings us on to refugees. Why is there also a big focus on refugees in Ireland and are they a factor for the lack of housing available?