Catherine Murphy (Kildare North, Social Democrats) | Oireachtas source

It was worth expanding out on the homelessness crisis because that 4,700 figure jumped out for me this morning, as it does every time. It may be down to our different experiences in dealing with people coming into our constituency offices. Last Friday three new families came into my office in the space of an hour. It usually happens on a Friday afternoon when I can do very little about it. We are seeing the stress these people are suffering. It is not possible to quantify the damage done by that experience of homelessness even if it is only for two or three months. Given the uncertainty and stress that is caused, we need to accurately capture the number of people it is damaging.

Mr. John McCarthy gave us figures for builds and acquiring leases. In terms of transparency we should not see builds and acquiring leases connected together because acquiring leases is not new, but existing. We need to see the amount of money for builds expressed separately on every occasion. Is regeneration included in that build component? A number of regeneration programmes are under way. Presumably they are also counted in that. Some of those go back many years, including, for example, O'Devaney Gardens and St. Michael's Estate in Inchicore. I ask Mr. John McCarthy to give us a note with a breakdown on regeneration.