Fianna Fáil has called for an increase in rent supplement to give people a chance to stay in their homes.

The cost of renting a home in Dublin has now surpassed the previous peak recorded at the height of the State’s property boom.

The party's public expenditure spokesman Dara Calleary said rising rents were contributing to the homelessness crisis.

" It's a major national crisis, there needs to be an increase in rent supplement to give people who are on low incomes a chance to make up for these increased rents to stop them being thrown on the streets," he told RTÉ's Morning Ireland.

The Mayo TD was responding to reports that rents have increased by 8.5 per cent over the past year, the third year in a row in which there was an increase.

“What we need is a big increase in supply. We need 25,000 new houses to be built every year.”

When asked about Fianna Fáil’s response to Wednesday’s announcement of an extra €500 million for the health service, he said: “We expect our priorities to be reflected in budgets, but we are still an opposition party and we will call the Government out when they make a major mistake like they have on this occasion.

“Last December we indicated there wasn’t enough money in health. We have said consistently that the last government got the health budget wrong. The health service budget has to change.

“The new system of government will be an opportunity for everyone to participate.”

The average monthly rental for a house in the capital in the first quarter is €1,454, according to the latest rent index published by the Residential Tenancies Board (RTB).

The figure is 0.2 per cent higher than that recorded in the last quarter of 2007, just before the crash.

A year ago the cost of renting a house was €1,342, so a tenant in the capital will have to pay some €1,300 more over the next 12 months.

Nationwide, the cost of renting a home continued to climb in the first part of the year, although the rate at which rents increased slowed compared with the last three months of 2015.

The new data shows that monthly rents were up half a point nationally in the first quarter of the year when compared with the previous three months.

A quarter-on-quarter growth rate of 1.6 per cent was recorded when the RTB published the index three months ago.

Rents in Dublin grew by 0.2 per cent over the first three months of the year.

Rents for houses in Dublin increased by 0.6 per cent while rents for apartments rose by 0.4 per cent.

For properties outside Dublin, rents were up by 0.9 per cent, with the cost of renting a house declining by half a point and apartment rents jumping by 4.2 per cent.