The Labour Party has said it is the fault of two Government Ministers that house prices have increased so much in the last four-and-a-half years.
Speaking on RTÉ's Morning Irelandthe Labour Party's spokesman on the Environment and Local Government, Mr Eamon Gilmour, called for the Minister for the Environment, Mr Noel Dempsey, and Minister of State Mr Bobby Molloy to resign.
"When they took over office four-and-a half years ago the average price of a new house was £73,000 and people working on a modest income could afford to buy a home of their own," he said.
Mr Gilmour said house prices had doubled over the Government’s tenure and that it had done nothing to address this problem.
Indeed, he said, it had encouraged land speculators to bid up the price of building land by dropping the capital gains tax on residential building land from 40 per cent to 20 per cent.