Nine years after a devastating crash in property prices catapulted the party of Irish Prime Minister Leo Varadkar into power, a housing market boom threatens to dump it into opposition in a general election this week.
A scarcity of housing has been the dominant domestic issue of Varadkar’s near three-year premiership, with average rents in Dublin higher than Tokyo, Sydney and Singapore and homelessness in Europe’s fastest growing economy hovering at record levels.
A Jan. 21 Irish Times/Ipsos MRBI opinion poll found that almost three out of every four voters would be most influenced by the struggling heath service or deficiencies in housing when casting their ballot.
Just three percent of potential voters identified the management of Brexit, a key diplomatic triumph for Varadkar that he has sought to put at the centre of the campaign.
