Mick Barry (Cork North Central, Solidarity) | Oireachtas source

My first question relates to the figures on housing completions for 2022 and 2023 that were released by the Department of Housing, Planning and Local Government yesterday, and which Mr. Allen commented on. If I understand him correctly, he is arguing that we need approximately 36,000 housing completions per annum to maintain homelessness and child homelessness at their current levels. If that figure will only be reached in 2022, that indicates that homelessness and child homelessness are set to increase in 2019, 2020, and 2021, and may be stabilised in 2022 before there is a fall in the numbers in 2023. Perhaps I have taken Mr. Allen up incorrectly in that regard, but if homelessness advocates, campaigners and experts come before the committee and say the figures the Department released yesterday indicate homelessness and child homelessness will increase year on year for the next three years, that needs to be part of the public debate that arises from this meeting. I ask him to comment on whether I have him right on that.

I address my second question to the representatives of the Mercy Law Resource Centre. If people are in family hub accommodation, and they are part of the cohort who have their own door, am I correct that they are not counted as part of the official homelessness figures released by the Department? I seek clarification on that. It was said that children who are homeless in this country are worse off than homeless children in the UK because they have fewer legal protections. Can the witnesses give us a couple of examples of what those lesser legal protections are? Where is the gap?

My next question is for the representatives of the Children's Rights Alliance. Family hubs are positive in that they are an improvement over what went before, but the speakers have clearly highlighted the potential negative effects, as well as the dangers of institutionalisation. When the committee heard about family hubs being taken out on five-year leases, we raised a warning about institutionalisation, because we have seen what that has meant for other vulnerable groups in this State in the past. Now we are hearing reports of people in accommodation for three and a half years, though that was in hotel and bed and breakfast accommodation rather than family hubs. Clearly, the danger of institutionalisation in family hubs is growing in the context of the figures we have discussed. I would like the witnesses to comment further on that.

Finally, I have a question for Mr. Muldoon. He did not make reference to it earlier but he has made a point in previous interviews that caught my attention, and I would like him to comment on it. Often, when we focus on the damage done to children by homelessness there is a focus on children of schoolgoing age and the type of scenario Deputy Casey mentioned where they are late for school, or are not able to go to school for a day or a week because of the distance and the disruption to family life. I read an interview Mr. Muldoon did where he speculated on the possibility that the damage done to very young children could be as great or even greater. I am not a child psychologist, but my understanding of what he said is that children sense what is going on around them, which causes trauma for a young child and the damage done, trauma suffered, and the consequences for both the individual and society might not be known for decades. I invite him to make further comment on that.