Mr. Paul Lemass:

My sense from engaging with the Department of Social Protection and MABS is that they were happy to take on this work and they did not raise any concerns regarding staffing at the time. The numbers thus far have been on the low side. We will, of course, monitor them and we will know more because every single declaration will have to have a referral to MABS. We will know exactly what the number is.

I will look into the question of RTB access over the Christmas period.

As regards local authority bans on evictions, we send out a circular around lockdowns to encourage local authorities to exercise forbearance and a similar approach is taken-----