The constitutional right to property should be amended to ease the grip of developers on land and increase the supply of social and affordable housing, an Oireachtas committee has been told.
The Conference of the Religious in Ireland (CORI) justice commission, which represents more than 100 religious congregations, says local authorities should be allowed to buy at cost price land due to be rezoned for housing, and prevent speculators from making windfall profits.
The local authority could then control the price of housing by selling the land to builders. Profits from such sales could be kept by the State and used to target social housing problems.
In its submission to the All-Party Oireachtas Committee on the Constitution, which is reviewing property rights, the commission says the accumulation of exorbitant profits through land speculation when many lack basic accommodation is "morally blameworthy". While the right to private property is important, it is not absolute and should carry a greater degree of social responsibility, it says.
Director of the commission, Father Seán Healy, said: "We believe these proposals would go some way towards restoring the balance between property rights and the common good, a balance that has been lost in recent years and that needs to be secured for the future."
The 17-page submission says this could be done in a practical way through amending the Constitution and introducing legislative changes allowing local authorities to purchase land on a voluntary or compulsory basis.
Land rezoned from agricultural use to housing use, for example, could be bought by the authority at its original price, plus a small margin for the owner. The rezoning could then occur while the land is in the hands of the local authority, so the main profits from the change in status is passed on to the State.
Latest figures show there are 48,400 households, or around 130,000 people, on local authority housing waiting lists. The stock of social housing has increased by just 4,400 units since 1996, according to Father Healy.
The submission also calls for a rights-based approach over the entitlement to housing, which would allow a person to appeal to the courts if they did not have appropriate accommodation.
The commission says these social, economic and cultural rights could be recognised while respecting the political process.
This could be done, it suggests, by imposing a legal requirement on each government to set targets in areas such as housing.
Failure to reach these targets would pave the way for a class action on behalf of the people affected, if it could be demonstrated that the government ignored its responsibilities.
