Victor Boyhan (Independent) | Oireachtas source

First, I welcome our guests who have come here today. This is not a blame game for anyone. That is what we need to get out of the way. It is a crisis in homelessness and we need to tackle it in a multifaceted and holistic way.

I picked up on some words there from Ms Timmons when she talked about the Housing for All implementation plan. That is really important. We need to police this and monitor it.

I have sat in this committee for the past five years on Rebuilding Ireland and heard so many promises. The focus now has to be on implementing this plan. I am fully supportive of it - better co-ordination, better communication and better synergies between agencies, NGOs and everyone who is involved in tackling this crisis. I do not want to go over all that history again and the multi-agency approach.

I will pick two issues that are critically important in terms of homelessness, that is, the national youth homeless strategy, which we need to focus on, as well as the need for us to stop people getting into homelessness. That is a real concern to me, particularly the focus on people who have been either in care, in the probation services in the prisons, on the margins of difficulties or on the margins of family breakdown who have had enormous difficulties. I am familiar with many of the agencies that work in the city here and the problem is buy-in. When you talk to a 15-year-old or 16-year-old who has had a breakdown in family relationships from early on, invariably, that young person has left his or her place of care or, in some cases, detention. How do you keep that relationship going? Then you mix that in with drug addiction.

Addiction is a big issue here. We need to be careful. I am very concerned by the stories I am hearing in relation to addiction, which, let us be honest, is a mental health issue but for which there are other reasons. We must accept that. I do not like the idea that any person would be excluded. I am hearing of young people who feel excluded from the health services and the health supports. We talk about wrap-around supports - lovely jargon - but they feel excluded in many ways and they are finding it difficult to access it. They feel they are excluded in terms of housing as well. I made a case to a housing authority. It does not make a difference in what housing authority it was - it was not one in Dublin. This was a woman in her 70s and they said that she had had addiction problems and a multiplicity of problems. Yes, but that is life and we must support them.

My concern here - I only want to focus on those two issues - is the area of addiction and vulnerable people, particularly young people, and how we will support them, and the issue of the national youth homelessness strategy because they are interlinked. I have no doubt walking the streets. I came through town fairly late on Friday night, on Talbot Street and thereabouts, and it is all over the place.

There is another aspect, of people who have come into this country from direct provision and other countries who are very vulnerable. They are vulnerable to abuse, addiction, sexual abuse and exploitation. These are our most vulnerable people on our streets and you only need to take a walk on any of our streets to see them. What I am asking Ms Timmons and Ms Hayes is that they focus on youth and addiction and how we can better improve facilities and outcomes for these highly vulnerable people, most of whom end up homeless.