Skip to main content

Varadkar says it’s ‘not the worst thing’ that Ryanair is buying up homes for staff

25 of the 28 units in a new development at Fostertown Place in Swords were purchased by Ryanair for their cabin crew. TAOISEACH LEO VARADKAR says he does not have any issue with Ryanair or other companies buying up almost entire housing estates for their staff.

He said there is a big difference between companies like Ryanair bulk-buying houses and apartments compared to investment funds.

“We are building over 30,000 new homes now every year,” he said.

“If you think about it, that’s 70,000, 80,000 or 90,000 bedrooms every year so we are finally seeing housing being built on scale,” Varadkar said.

“We want to scale that up this year and next year as well because we do have a rising population and family sizes are getting smaller, so we need more housing and we are making progress,” he said.

“In relation to Ryanair specifically, I don’t think it is the worst thing that a company would buy accommodation for their staff. It’s not the first time this has happened, it has been happening for centuries,” the Taoiseach added.

“I think it is different to an investment fund, for example, buying up houses that could be bought by families.”

He was responding to criticism after 25 of the 28 units in a new development at Fostertown Place in Swords were purchased by Ryanair for their cabin crew.

The Taoiseach was speaking in Athenry where he opened BIA Innovator campus where €8 million has been provided in funding to assists start-up, micro and small food businesses in three state of the art buildings on the Teagasc complex.

He said these workers would also need housing and that some companies had been proactive in sourcing accommodation for generations.

“A lot of the people who work for Ryanair are local people and they are people living around Swords and living around towns around the airport and some of them live in my own constituency. The fundamental thing we need to ensure is there is enough housing for everyone to buy,” Varadkar said.

“A huge amount of housing is being built in Swords, the Fingal area, affordable schemes, cost rental schemes, a lot of that coming through and what we need to do when it comes to housing is instead of having people fighting over the pie, it’s about making sure the pie is big enough for everyone,” he said.

“One of the things I was delighted to see today was the number of first-time buyers drawing down their mortgage is at levels we have not seen since 2007. I was in my 20s in 2007 so it’s great to see we are back to that stage again where so many people are able to buy their own homes,” he added.

People Before Profit Fingal has condemned Ryanair’s purchase of the homes.

“Bulk purchasing by corporations and vulture funds must be banned from our society,” People Before Profit Swords representative Ollie Power said.

With reporting by Hayley Halpin, The Journal ie

Popular posts from this blog

Ireland's Celtic Tiger Excesses...

'Bang twins' may never get to run a business again... POST-boom Ireland is awash with cautionary tales of Celtic Tiger excesses, as a rattle around the carcasses of fallen property developers and entrepreneurs will show. Few can compete with the so-called Bang twins for youth, glamour and tasteful extravagance. Simon and Christian Stokes, the 35-year-old identical twins behind Bang Cafe and exclusive private members club, Residence, saw their entire business go bust with debts of €9m, €3m of which is owed to the tax man. The debt may be in the ha'penny place compared with the eye-watering billions owed by some of their former customers. But their fall has been arguably steeper and more damning than some of the country's richest tycoons. Last week, further humiliation was heaped on them with revelations that even as their businesses were going under, the twins spent €146,000 of company money in 18 months on designer shopping sprees, five star holidays and sumptu...

Property Crash Homes For Sale...

Hundreds of repossessed homes in Ireland to be sold by auction... UK property consultancy Allsop to hold auction in April at Dublin's Shelbourne hotel: Flats in Ireland that could have fetched €150,000 in the Celtic Tiger years are to be put on the market for as little as €25,000 (£21,000) in the country's first ever mass auction of repossessed homes. And, in a sign of how wide the property crash is, the latest item to turn up in liquidation sales in Dublin is a job lot of 15 cranes, including a pair towering over Anglo Irish Bank's half-built headquarters in the city's docklands. "Tower cranes were among the most sought-after heavy plant and machinery 10 years ago," Ricky Wilson of Wilsons Auctions says. "You couldn't buy them quick enough. Now they are left idle for two or three years on sites." He has 15 cranes worth €500,000 going on sale on 26 March, with German, Dutch and Polish buyers expressing interest. But it is the auction ...

Property Ireland - Irish Land Values Go Up Like A Rocket & Fall Like A Stone...

Land values go up like a rocket and fall like a stone... SITE EVALUATION: Why would a developer bid €225,000 an acre in 1999 and €2.8m an acre in 2007? Bill Nowlan explains WHY HAS THE value of development land fallen so precipitously, by over 50 per cent in the past 12 months, when residential and other property values have only fallen by 25 per cent or 30 per cent? There is an old property cliché which says that "land values go up like a rocket and fall like a stone" and this seems to have been bourne out in Ireland over recent years. Why does this happen? To answer this question requires an insight into the way developers prepare their bids for development land and I set out below a glimpse into that process. Let me start by looking at how a developer in normal times estimates his bid for a plot of land with planning permission, which in estate agents' parlance is ready-to-go. The key starting point in a developers equations is the expected sale price of the finished b...