Ms Eileen Gleeson:

There was a question on private rented accommodation and looking for properties outside the Dublin region. HAP is structured in the same way as the process for people applying for a housing needs assessment. They go on a list and there are various bands for various local authorities. In the Dublin Region Homeless Executive, we argue that we need to get people in the HAP system out to Cavan, Meath and beyond, as that is where the surplus private rented properties are. That would take the pressure off the centre. There are people who would quite happily live outside the Dublin region if we could give them HAP support to do that and not have an impact on their eligibility for housing. We are working with the Department on changing the structures of the way HAP is formulated so we can apply the process where people want to move. It would be really useful to us to mop up that surplus private rented accommodation.

Anybody in emergency accommodation is automatically linked to a support, whether it is a single person or a family. When these people move to tenancies from emergency accommodation, there are various supports in place, such as the support to live independently, SLI. Sometimes they only need support for a little while and they avail of it, and sometimes they needs supports for longer. That is why we have long-term accommodation as well, as some people will always need support.

With regard to prevention, 50% of the people coming to us and presenting in crisis and at risk of becoming homeless come from the private rented sector. It is even more than 50%. The rest come from what we call "family circumstances". In reality, many of them would have come from the private rented sector as well. They may have gone home or to live with relatives or friends before the relationship broke down. They then come to us. Their last place of accommodation would have been with a family member or friend. The ticked box is "family circumstances" rather than for the "private rented sector". There are many more people coming from the private rented sector than we have on the data. We are working on that to specify the last three or four places that people stay so we can get a pattern.

HAP is very beneficial in preventing people from entering homelessness in the first place. In the nine months taken in with the report, 1,232 people were prevented from ever accessing emergency accommodation because we used HAP to prevent them ever coming in. It is a major tool for prevention until social housing supply comes in. I am not here to speak to the supply side but we need a supply of housing, whether it is private or social, to keep people from ever having to enter emergency accommodation.