Oireachtas Joint and Select Committees

Thursday, 3 June 2021

Public Accounts Committee

Vote 34 - Housing, Planning and Local Government (resumed)

9:50 am

Photo of Seán SherlockSeán Sherlock (Cork East, Labour) | Oireachtas source

I am conscious of my time. The point I make here is that the witnesses acknowledge that there is an issue with inspections. The Covid-19 pandemic has had a bearing in terms of the number of inspections. I ask that this is prioritised, so that the Department would liaise with the local authorities in order to ensure that the inspection regime is fit for purpose, robust, and properly resourced, and so that there is a significant increase in the number of whole-time equivalents, WTEs, that would be tasked with this.

That is the only ask I have. I do not think it is fair to ask a tenant to walk around with a mobile phone to look at his or her house. We have to get people back into houses as quickly as possible. This is about taxpayers’ money at the end of the day. If we are talking about taxpayers’ money, we cannot have a situation where we have quite literally slum landlords. This is the outworking and the resourcing of the policy. Families with children with respiratory illnesses are coming to me because they are not in proper, fit-for-purpose accommodation. That is a poor day for Ireland in terms of how we deal with families under those schemes.

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