Jennifer Murnane O'Connor (Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I thank the witnesses for their report. One third of 50,000 social homes to be provided under Rebuilding Ireland are to be delivered by 2021. My main concern is the lack of joined up thinking among all the agencies concerned with housing. The agencies are falling down in that area. Saying that housing assistance payments, HAP, do not fall within the remit of one or other of the agencies does not work. All the agencies are involved in Rebuilding Ireland, and they should remember that there is a reason that 10,000 people, including children, are homeless. The reality is that we do not have enough houses. Everyone, including local authorities and the different Departments, must sit down and have a conversation but this is not happening. It frightens me to think that people are passing the buck. People are happy to say that something is not part of their remit and that they have nothing to do with it. Unless we sit down and have this conversation, we will be back here in 2021 and will be no further along. We have a housing crisis. Hearing witnesses say there are houses out there concerns me because homeless people come to my clinic and I cannot find anywhere for them to live. I am begging people for help.

All the local authorities and relevant agencies have to come together to fix this problem. We have to follow through with Rebuilding Ireland. One of the witnesses mentioned her son, and I can understand his position. People are disillusioned and disheartened, and it is hard to listen to people declare at this committee that they will make the plan work. I hope we do but we have to be realistic and say that we will make it work in the long-term. I get so disheartened by all this. Every few weeks, witnesses appear and tell us that a particular issue is not something within the remit of their Department. If all the Departments with responsibilities in the area of housing do not work together, and cannot see what has been happening and what has been spent on housing, they are not doing taxpayers any favours.

It is not fair on the witnesses or on members who are trying to represent people in their areas. Unless we all start working together, including every sector of the Department of Housing, Planning and Local Government, it is not going to work.