{"id":15498,"date":"2026-02-12T11:53:12","date_gmt":"2026-02-12T11:53:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.socialdemocrats.ie\/?p=15498"},"modified":"2026-02-12T11:53:34","modified_gmt":"2026-02-12T11:53:34","slug":"government-must-increase-hap-limits-on-an-emergency-basis-to-avoid-tsunami-of-homelessness-rory-hearne-td","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.socialdemocrats.ie\/ga\/government-must-increase-hap-limits-on-an-emergency-basis-to-avoid-tsunami-of-homelessness-rory-hearne-td\/","title":{"rendered":"Government must increase HAP limits on an emergency basis to avoid tsunami of homelessness"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>The government must increase Housing Assistance Payment (HAP) rates on an emergency basis to avoid a tsunami of homelessness, according to Social Democrats TD Rory Hearne.<\/p>\n<p>Deputy Hearne, who is the party\u2019s housing spokesperson, said:<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThe latest \u2018Locked Out of the Market\u2019 report from the Simon Communities of Ireland will come as a further blow to renters &#8211; just one day after the government rammed its flawed Residential Tenancies Bill through the D\u00e1il.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThis is the charity\u2019s 40<sup>th<\/sup>\u00a0report detailing the chronic state of Ireland\u2019s rental market \u2013 and the first to find zero properties available to rent within standard Housing Assistance Payment (HAP) limits.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThis is now beyond a crisis \u2013 it is a social catastrophe that disproportionately impacts some of our most vulnerable renters. More than 53,000 households are reliant on HAP, representing upwards of 100,000 people.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI am now calling on the government to raise standard HAP rates on an emergency basis \u2013 and increase the discretionary limit in cases where there is an immediate risk of homelessness.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThe human cost of this government-made disaster is colossal as the numbers living in homeless emergency accommodation continue to rise. Alarmingly, there are around 5,000 household evictions every quarter \u2013 where on earth are those people expected to find anywhere affordable to rent, even when discretionary HAP rates are applied?<\/p>\n<p>\u201cDue to the government\u2019s failure to deliver enough social or affordable homes, more and more households are completely dependent on HAP to put a roof over their heads as they can\u2019t afford to pay market rents.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cMeanwhile, the government last night voted through a deeply problematic bill that will see rents increase even further and push more people into emergency accommodation and hidden homelessness.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cToday\u2019s report from the Simon Communities of Ireland is yet another reminder of the complete mess that Fianna F\u00e1il and Fine Gael have made of housing.\u201d<\/p>\n<p><em>February 12, 2026<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The government must increase Housing Assistance Payment (HAP) rates on an emergency basis to avoid a tsunami of homelessness, according to Social Democrats TD Rory Hearne. Deputy Hearne, who is the party\u2019s housing spokesperson, said: \u201cThe latest \u2018Locked Out of the Market\u2019 report from the Simon Communities of Ireland will come as a further blow [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":12981,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[663,10,7,737,510],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-15498","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-homelessness","category-housing-crisis","category-press-release","category-rents","category-rory-hearne"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v27.3 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-wordpress\/ -->\n<title>Government must increase HAP limits on an emergency basis to avoid tsunami of homelessness - Social Democrats<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.socialdemocrats.ie\/government-must-increase-hap-limits-on-an-emergency-basis-to-avoid-tsunami-of-homelessness-rory-hearne-td\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"ga_IE\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Government must increase HAP limits on an emergency basis to avoid tsunami of homelessness - Social Democrats\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"The government must increase Housing Assistance Payment (HAP) rates on an emergency basis to avoid a tsunami of homelessness, according to Social Democrats TD Rory Hearne. 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