Eoin Ó Broin (Dublin Mid West, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

Absolutely. All of this has been in the public domain over the past week. Limerick involved 24 families in Focus Ireland section 10-funded temporary accommodation with no tenancies. There is a long-term plan over four years to potentially turn those into real tenancies following refurbishment but in the view of Focus Ireland, that is emergency temporary accommodation. The case of Louth County Council is interesting.

Some 100 families were removed. Some 86 of those were in temporary arrangements in properties leased by the local authority from the private rental sector, but they were families that the local authority was trying to house elsewhere. Another 22 were transitioning to housing assistance payment, HAP, but at the time of the figures they did not have HAP tenancies and were being funded through section 10. Yes, I absolutely accept that 20 of those 100 families were in HAP tenancies. They were getting a top-up from section 10 funding, but they had HAP tenancies. On the basis of the figures from those five local authorities, 172 families were removed and only 20 had tenancies. The reason this is important is that the definition of homelessness underpinning those reports has been crystal clear to everybody involved for years. It excludes people who have a tenancy with a local authority, an approved housing body or the private rental sector. Anybody else who is in a temporary arrangement funded by section 10 does not have a tenancy and is homeless.

The Minister is correct. We have had a situation over the last two years where families are spending a longer period in emergency accommodation than was traditionally the case. People used to stay night to night, for three months or for six months. However, because the homelessness crisis has become so acute, families are now spending up to two years in these temporary transitional arrangements, without tenancies, and with the local authority or approved housing body intending to move them on.

I seem to have more information than the Minister, which is astounding because I just contacted the local authorities. On the basis of the information that I have got, 152 households of the 172 identified were homeless at the time they were removed, did not have tenancies and were in temporary section 10-funded emergency accommodation, and were removed with the Minister's approval. Kildare County Council tells us via email that the Department asked it to remove households and it refused - this is in black and white, and I will share it with everybody - on the grounds that the accommodation that these people lived in was temporary and did not meet their needs.

Perhaps I am seeing a Minister who does not understand the difference between a tenancy and a temporary emergency accommodation arrangement. If he does not understand that fundamental difference, then my opinion is that he is not competent to hold the job he is in because it is such a basic definition in homeless services. Alternatively, he does understand the difference. He knows very well the difference between a tenancy and a temporary licence agreement, but he is still allowing hundreds of families to be removed from the figures. If that is the case, then I have to say, and it gives me no pleasure to say this, he is not fit to hold the office he holds. The Minister absolutely cannot remove families from homeless figures when they are in emergency accommodation without tenancies. I urge the Minister to go and meet the experts. He should meet Mr. Eoin O'Sullivan from Trinity College Dublin who helped to design this system, and the people from the National Homelessness Consultative Committee-----