Ms Sinéad Lucey:

I welcome the comments of Senator O'Reilly and Deputy Stanton. One of our other experiences is that there is very little consistency and transparency about housing lists and priority from local authority to local authority. As I understand it from working in the area, most of the Dublin local authorities have a numerical system whereby people know where they are on the list, and that they are number 20 or 25, for example. Most of the local authorities outside Dublin do not have a numerical system so people have no idea where they are on the list compared to others.

When there is that lack of transparency it is very hard to know whether there is an element of racism seeping into the housing list. Deputy Stanton also picked up on the fact of the deoprioritisation, almost, of Travellers in that they lost being a Traveller, in and of itself, as a ground for priority. In a way, that totally neglects the circumstances in which most Travellers will be living when they do apply for housing and the huge disadvantage they face in accessing the private housing market because it is not immune from racism either. Thus Travellers will be at a double disadvantage but get no priority now on the housing list. They are really good points to pick up on.

Senator Pauline O'Reilly raised a point on Part V funding. I am not sure I understand that enough to comment but the State does provide ring-fenced funding for Traveller accommodation and it does not get drawn down so any other ring-fencing would have to get around that same issue. Hopefully the changes around Part V will bring some benefit to Travellers but it is unlikely to confer anything over and above what anybody else gets or to address the systemic issues.