The Irish government has come under fire for failing to put affordability front and centre of the housing system during this year's budget.

Labour representative Rebecca Moynihan hit out at Housing Minister Darragh O'Brien for failing to establish a vacant homes tax and called for more radical action.

Senator Moynihan said: "Government have bottled the opportunity to have a vision for our housing system that puts affordability for people front and centre. It's hard to read the constant spin from a Minister who has no interest in actually introducing radical changes in housing like a vacant home tax.

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"There was an opportunity to introduce this and a range of other measures in this year's budget but instead of doing so government ploughed ahead with their favoured carrot approach for investors. Their talk and their policy is very different.

"We still see properties lying vacant around the country and there’s no impetus from government to bring it back into the use. A strong vacant homes tax would actually be able to bring former homes, including permanently empty apartments and derelict houses, back to use. By introducing this and improving CPO powers and funding for local authorities to repurpose empty homes, government could get more houses into supply."

This comes after the Oireachtas committee heard earlier this week that Dublin City Council were not using their CPO powers, sparking concern similar situations are happening all over the country.

Moynihan added: "Having a safe, secure home is a human right, it's the benchmark of a decent society and Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael have failed to deliver this since 2016. The broken market needs heavy State intervention, with strong local authority powers, to strongly motivate those with vacant homes to bring them back onto the market."