Ms Tanya Ward:

There is quite a lot we could be doing to address the situation for the 3,824 children who are in homeless accommodation. One thing that is striking about our housing laws and policy is that they were developed at a time when the main group of people availing of homeless services were men with addiction issues, rough sleepers and so on. Given that children make up such a significant cohort of the homeless population, it is something we need to look at. If we oblige decision makers to make decisions in the best interests of children, it would mean that when they develop accommodation solutions, that they have to think about the child. One of the issues we hear from our members is that there is a major variation in the stock that is used in homeless services. One might get a family hub with great facilities for families, such as great play facilities and then another might not have sufficient facilities at all. The early years providers of services are seeing that. They see children who do not have play facilities, children who do not a have a space to crawl and the big concern for very young children is that they will miss all their developmental milestones so that when they arrive at school, they will be way behind all the other children as well.

When it comes to the educational and emotional welfare of young people going through this experience, what was very striking from the Ombudsman for Children's consultation was the fact that children themselves did not see family hubs as the solution to homelessness. What they want is a home as soon as possible, they want security because it is such a destabilising experience. Something we have called for in our campaigns, Report Card 2019 and No Child 2020 is a time limit on the use of homeless accommodation. If one minimises it to six months, one could try to minimise the impact of institutionalisation.

We are seeing the impact of institutionalisation on children, especially in the consultation document from the Ombudsman for Children and the research we commissioned last year on homelessness. To give examples, 14 year old children do not have the possibility of being able to go to the family room on their own. Children have to sign in every day, which makes them feel there are in a prison. They are told what to do by other adults other than their parents. That is what institutionalisation starts to feel like.

Another piece, from an educational point of view, which we uncovered in research we published last year was the distinction between a DEIS school and a non-DEIS school. The DEIS school has more flexibility, a breakfast club and funding to provide extra supports for children. In the main, schools are doing the best they can and doing a very good job for the children. What non-DEIS schools have told us is that they have no flexible budgets to do anything. If a child arrives in a dirty school uniform, they have no money available and teachers are spending their own money to buy clothes for a child. They are also spending their own money to feed children. What the schools have stated they need for a temporary period is a home-school liaison officer or teacher to support families. Principals say they sometimes ring Focus Ireland, accommodation providers or hotels to try to get a family into accommodation. A home-school liaison officer could do that work. The findings of the research show that the emotional well-being of families is being affected. Teachers say this happens over a period of time. When that starts to happen, children start to miss school because they are ashamed of having to describe their situation as homelessness. They say they have to leave early and cannot hang out with their friends after school. They start to lose their motivation and they are more vulnerable to dropping out. That is where we need a school completion programme. We have had a lot of dealings with them in tracking the children to make sure we can keep them in school, but it is really about supporting the school to promote the well-being of children and give them the emotional toolkit they need to mind their mental health and emotions and giving schools the resources they need to do the best job they can.