7. Plaid Cymru Debate: The private rental sector

Part of the debate – in the Senedd at 6:00 pm on 12 October 2022.

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Photo of Mabon ap Gwynfor Mabon ap Gwynfor Plaid Cymru 6:00, 12 October 2022

That's the policy that you're perpetuating. Now, what we did hear as well, thanks to Luke's intervention and Sioned, was that they did mention the fact that what we need to do is protect people, not assets. Houses are homes. They are where people need to live; they are not the way for people to make profit, which is what the Tories have been propagating here. 

We heard from Sam Rowlands about empty homes—absolutely, we agree. We need to bring empty homes back into use again. And we heard a lot of ideas around empty homes, around developing social housing, and others. These are all long-term ideas. They don't deal with the crisis that we are facing today and they won't help those people that are facing evictions over the coming months over this winter period. 

Heledd referred to students and the fact that 60 per cent of their income goes on rent. I'm glad to say that NUS Wales/UCMC support this call today. Also, it's worth noting that the TUC are also supporting action on rent controls and rent freezes. In fact, two years ago, a TUC survey showed that 66 per cent of their members supported this motion, and only 8 per cent oppose it. 

Carolyn mentioned the post-war Clement Attlee Government. The thing with that post-war Government was that housing was then under the public health department. It shows the importance and ties in exactly with what Mike Hedges said about that link between poor housing and poor health. Mike also referenced Airbnb, and what we're finding at the moment is that landlords—different from what Sam said earlier that landlords are leaving the sector—yes, they're leaving the sector and they're going and transferring their property over to Airbnbs, or, in some cases, they're profiting from the high price value of houses. 

So, that's the situation we have, but the fact remains that everyone should be guaranteed high-quality, affordable housing, but this isn't the case here in Wales at the moment, and it's been exacerbated by the cost of living and housing crisis that's occurring at the moment. We're told that the first responsibility of a Government in a democratic society is to protect and safeguard the lives of its citizens. This is said at a time of conflict when we're at war—every time we hear of conflict, millions and billions of pounds are pumped into supporting and ensuring the safety of our citizens.  Well, this is the case today. We need to make sure that we defend and protect our citizens and make sure that they don't suffer because of homelessness, because they can't afford to have a roof above their heads.