Damien English (Meath West, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

The short answer is that the money is absorbed into the overall housing budget. Naturally, though, it is more focused. The expert panel is due to report in April. It is on track to do that. This committee has worked on the issue as well. We hope to increase capital spending on Traveller-specific accommodation. When we fund general accommodation, that is available to Traveller families as well. It is not being spent directly where we would like it to be, but it is still being spent on housing. Current spending has increased from €4.7 million to €5.3 million. That increase has generally been on social workers working with Traveller families to help them to access non-Traveller-specific accommodation. There is increased activity in that regard. The money is being absorbed by housing. Naturally, however, the desire of everyone present is that we increase spending on capital projects, which I hope will be the case from this year on.