Eoin Ó Broin (Dublin Mid West, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

I move amendment No. 5:

In page 8, between lines 12 and 13, to insert the following: “(b) to provide land for the provision of Traveller specific accommodation,”.

As every member of the committee knows, the failure of local and central government to meet the housing needs of the Traveller community is one of our greatest national disgraces. It is not just that members of the Traveller community have to wait longer times, whether for Traveller-specific accommodation or general needs social housing, but the failure of local authorities up to 2020 to spend the money the Government had given to them added to that scandal. In fairness to the previous Government, it increased the Traveller accommodation budget to local authorities - modestly but it was an increase nonetheless. In the years 2016 to 2019, however, only half of the total budget allocation was spent. If that is compared with general needs social housing, in most of those years the Government came back seeking additional funds in a Supplementary Estimate.

Last year was different. For the first year in a long time, 100% of the Traveller accommodation budget provided by the Department to local authorities was spent. The problem is a large portion of that was not spent on new housing. Of course, it was absolutely necessary for it to be spent on Covid-19-related safety measures, as well as other site improvements but until we start to deliver significant volumes of new Traveller-specific accommodation and larger general needs social housing to meet the needs of Traveller families, we will continue to have this problem.

Professor Michelle Norris, one of the members of the expert group on Traveller accommodation who presented to the committee previously, described this as an eminently solvable problem. She outlined that there are legally binding Traveller accommodation programmes for local authorities, as well as budgetary allocations. The number of individuals and households we are talking about is not very large but the failure of State institutions and, in particular in this instance, local authorities to do what they are meant to do to implement Traveller accommodation programmes is the starting problem.

I acknowledge the good work of the Minister of State, Deputy English, who headed up the expert review group on Traveller accommodation, which produced a very good report. I also welcome the fact that in the programme for Government, the full implementation of that report is referenced, and the Minister of State, Deputy Peter Burke, is leading a subgroup of the national Traveller accommodation consultative committee in regard to its implementation. Nevertheless, given the role the Government is giving to the Land Development Agency, it seems remiss not to place the same legal obligation on the agency that currently exists with local authorities to deliver Traveller-specific accommodation. My fear is that while the Minister may say nothing is preventing the LDA from including Traveller-specific accommodation in any of the sites it is developing or master-planning, my experience tells me that if something is not referenced specifically in the Bill, particularly in a section such as this, the likelihood of it not happening, particularly in light of the history of Traveller accommodation not being provided, is significant.

Both amendments Nos. 5 and 91 seek to place, in the two appropriate sections, a very clear legal obligation on the LDA, where it is involved in residential development or master-planning, to ensure there is appropriate provision of Traveller-specific accommodation to meet the needs of the Traveller community in those developments. My amendment is not so specific as to state it has to be in every LDA development, although that is what I would ultimately like to see if we go down this route, but it would place an important legal obligation on them. If that is not in the Bill, I think we will be back here in a year or two asking why the LDA is not contributing to the tackling of this important deficit in our housing system.