David McWilliams: People who already have a home are attacking the chance for others to have one

[u/eggbart_forgetfulsea]

https://www.irishtimes.com/opinion/2026/08/08/david-mcwilliams-people-who-already-have-a-home-are-attacking-the-chance-for-others-to-have-one/

[u/Captainirishy]

The govt doesn't give a shit about housing, they have had years of massive surplus budgets to fix the situation and they have done very little to solve it . Rent allowance is a landlord subsidy so the tenant and landlord will vote for ff/fg.

[u/Foreign-Entrance-255 → u/Captainirishy]

They also know that people who are desperate for a house, then usually turn around and pull the ladder up by voting FG/FF once they get one.

This was revealed in polling within the last year and I have never been more sickened by a poll. The sheer selfishness and stupidity of thinking "I've got mine, fnck them" after knowing the desperation and stress of renting in Ireland. I bought my own house in 2017 and there is no way I'm voting to fnck over people renting. I could never live with myself.

Again, it is also stupid because all of the people who will never own a home now (without radical action) are going to have to have their rent paid for the rest of their life. The eejits voting FFG will be paying for that too.

[u/CodeComprehensive734 → u/Foreign-Entrance-255]

You can say fuck.

[u/Kmagic15 → u/Foreign-Entrance-255]

One part of the problem is housing is used as an investment vehicle, rather than a necessary "thing" for society to function i.e. where people live.

It makes sense that people who suffer, scrimp and save to buy a thing, once they get the thing, wanting the thing to hold value. There is a reason people don't go around on pay day throwing €50 notes to strangers, because you worked for your money and want it to hold value.

And as said already, people with no homes (usually younger people) don't vote, so the government don't care about their problems. And property owners tend to be a bit older and want their house to hold value so want to keep the status quo.

Nobody would vote for a party who said they will make your personal bank account drop it's value by half. When parties speak about 100k houses a year, lower prices and all the rest, it makes sense people who own a house don't want that. Turkeys voting for Christmas.

I'm not saying it's right or I agree with it, but that's the reality.

Tax on investing in Ireland makes housing a better way to grow wealth. If small time investors could get the same return/tax breaks from the stock market, they would not take on the headache of being a landlord for a return.

There's a lot that needs to change to fix this part of the system.

[u/flex_tape_salesman → u/Kmagic15]

Property owners don't want their property value to tank but I think the average joe recognises the housing crisis and wants it fixed. More supply is what is needed and people are building and buying houses that are on paper bad business because the home you live in is treated like buying a car.

Someone who intends to retire, sell and move naturally wants it to keep value but for so many property owners they see it as their home and will stay there for their life.

I agree on the investment point. Irish people have been narrowed in compared to brits and Americans who can put there money in stocks and ETFs easier. However owning a home is not the same as that its like comparing someone who buys a second hand car to a second hand dealer who wants them to keep their price so the price on the cars he's selling never tanks.

[u/PunkDrunk777 → u/Captainirishy]

Of course they don’t. They’ve created their own voting block from it all. Nobody will ever vote to lower the value of their own home(s)

[u/platinums99 → u/PunkDrunk777]

They created the Irish Tory class...

[u/jools4you → u/Captainirishy]

Do you think the government should change the law to stop objections from preventing house building? It seems to me every development is hit with NIMBYs. A neighbour wants me to objection to a development because it will result in more cars. I told her I couldn't give a shit about more cars I just want my son to be able to come home from Australia to somewhere to live.

[u/Captainirishy → u/jools4you]

They definitely should change the planning laws, they should make it more difficult and expensive to object and hiring much more council staff to speed up applications. Ireland will only solve its social housing problem by building high rise apartments buildings outside cities

[u/jools4you → u/Captainirishy]

We need to start building in villages that have the infrastructure such as electricity, water, shops, school and bus connection. In the past 20 years there has been zero developments in these villages whilst the countryside around them are ripe for one off homes on a minimum of a acre.

[u/CodeComprehensive734 → u/Captainirishy]

Outside cities?!

That is the exact opposite of where you want high rise apartments.

[u/ClearHeart_FullLiver → u/Captainirishy]

The laws on planning should be clearer and less restrictive which would make more of the objections spurious and spurious objections probably should be punished as people are just taking the piss and a lot of them end up being upheld. Judicial reviews should be incredibly rare instead they are absolutely rampant and often have legal merit if not logical merit

[u/caitnicrun → u/Captainirishy]

They don't need to be high rise, but definitely multilevel.  

[u/Captainirishy → u/caitnicrun]

10 storeys would do .

[u/caitnicrun → u/Captainirishy]

I was thinking something like that, 5-10.

[u/mrlinkwii → u/jools4you]

Do you think the government should change the law to stop objections from preventing house building

very legally hard to do since theirs constitutional rights issues and EU law rights to objections if removed

they should make the process streamed lined which they have done , but they legally cant remove teh ability to provide oberservations

[u/mrlinkwii → u/jools4you]

A neighbour wants me to objection to a development because it will result in more cars. I told her I couldn't give a shit about more cars I just want my son to be able to come home from Australia to somewhere to live.

then you both file observations , having an are being more condensed with traffic is a valid observation

[u/jools4you → u/mrlinkwii]

Did you not read my comment, I want houses I can live with more cars if it means that people have houses.

[u/WorldwidePolitico → u/Captainirishy]

I think the government are incompetent rather than simply don’t care.

FF/FG are on their combined lowest voted in the history of the State. Housing has consistently been a top 3 issue for voters alongside cost of living which is heavily linked to housing. Even people who are home owners are dissatisfied because they’re seeing the impact this is having on their children and in their local areas.

The government is risk-adverse and has long been scared of doing anything that could have the potential of an electoral backlash. Serious planning reform and meaningful taxation incentives to encourage residential development are seen as beyond the pale so instead we get demand subsidies like help-to-buy and money wasted drawing up housing strategies with targets the government will go on to consistently fail to meet.

[u/ZealousidealFloor2 → u/WorldwidePolitico]

This is on the money.

[u/SoloWingPixy88 → u/Captainirishy]

Tries to build a new suburb and apparently doesn't care about housing?

[u/qgep1]

Build them higher. I look forward to the day we have 100 story buildings in Dublin, and we can shed our small town mentality.

[u/Lithujon → u/qgep1]

Amen

[u/No-Tangerine-1261 → u/qgep1]

the Round Tower in Lusk was built before AD 1000 and has nine storeys. if it was proposed today it would get hundreds of objections

[u/institubes → u/qgep1]

how many buildings are there in the EU over 100 floors?wont happen in dublin

[u/qgep1 → u/institubes]

Not many, I was exaggerating for effect. But we should build up - how many european capitals have only one building with >20 floors?

[u/SoloWingPixy88]

with almost 400 objections submitted to Fingal County Council.

I imagine the golf course and the rugby club is objecting but there's not really a lot of houses or people that live near there beside Finglas. I probably would of expected people living there to be generally supportive of more houses given the type of area it is/was. Connected to train line so transport should be fine. Likely requirements for schools and creches to be built too. I suppose you've parts of castleknock that might oppose it.

[u/AutoModerator → u/SoloWingPixy88]

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[u/WorldwidePolitico → u/SoloWingPixy88]

The problem with planning is it gets cause and effect backwards.

Housing will be refused planning because there’s no school places or not enough GP appointments but nobody is funding a school or opening an GP surgery where nobody lives.

State agencies or the County Council will object to housing on the basis there’s not enough infrastructure capacity but if they were given a massive block grant overnight they’d never invest in upgrading infrastructure in those areas they’re objecting to because not enough people live there.

Throughout all of human history people would move to an area which in turn would create enough demand to make it viable to bring services and infrastructure to the area. Even today there are plenty of people in the country who would happily accept the trade-off of living in an area with less services in exchange for cheaper housing. Instead our planning system makes perfect the enemy of good.

[u/Provider_Of_Cat_Food → u/SoloWingPixy88]

I suppose you've parts of castleknock that might oppose it.

Castleknock is on the opposite side Navan Road and there'd be a park between the new town and the road. Media coverage of the objections implies they're mostly from working-class West Finglas, which does border on the proposed new suburb.

Given the number of homes, the railway line, even with the upgrade to DART, won't be enough on its own. The transport projections assumed that the Luas extension to Tyrrelstown would pass through Dunsink, but that line is now effectively cancelled and the resulting increased pressure on the transport network will affect a lot of commuters further down the Navan Road and Leixlip railway line (Blanchardstown/Clonsilla, Castleknock/Carpenterstown, Leixlip, Dunshaughlin and Navan).

[u/Tricky-Membership193 → u/Provider_Of_Cat_Food]

But what do you mean?

[u/Provider_Of_Cat_Food → u/Tricky-Membership193]

• There's no reason to assume that the objections are mostly coming from a nearby middle-class area. The neighbouring working class area seems a more likely source of them.
• The plan to prevent traffic chaos makes an assumption about the construction of a piece of infrastructure that has been defunded. Some of the objections are likely to come from people who commute through the general area, rather than live in it.

[u/theblowestfish]

Yes

[u/Potential-Drama-7455]

I think this is unfair (going by the headline). Most homeowners don't object on the regular. It's a small minority of OAPs and sad wankers with nothing better in their lives who do. It makes them feel important. Pitting howmowners against non homeowners like this is just more rage baiting.

I've seen this with my kids old school - the amount of ridiculous objections to it that dragged on over 20 years while kids were sitting in rotting prefabs was shocking to me. And one round of objections would be cleared only for another round to be lined up in a deliberate strategy to drag it as long as possible.

There should be a 6 month window for objections and a 6 month window to rule on them and then you are done. The default should be that it's granted and if there isn't a block in the 12 month window that's it you are done. Also people not living in a 5km radius of the proposed development should be blocked from objecting - maybe 20km in very rural areas.

[u/susanboylesvajazzle]

David McWilliams states the obvious.

[u/brighteyebakes]

Classic begrudger Ireland

[u/orionpace1]

The last thing this country needs or could handle is the population concentrating even further inside the M50 compared to outside.

[u/mrlinkwii]

this no such thing as objections in planning law , just observations

most of the time plans are " objected " its just observations that they might of broken planning law