Emer Higgins (Dublin Mid West, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I thank the witnesses for attending the committee and ask them to thank their teams because they are at the coal face of the housing crisis. We appreciate everything their teams do, especially the team in South Dublin County Council which helps me and my constituents on a daily basis but also Fingal County Council which provides a similar service in its community.

It is great to welcome two councils that are the national leaders on tackling vacancy and to say well done on that. I hope more will be done to drive it down even further.

I have two questions for each local authority which I have asked of all local authorities that come before the committee. I will then focus this contribution on South Dublin County Council and come back to Fingal County Council in subsequent contributions.

My first question for both councils is whether their homeless counters are open and how many full-time equivalent posts were sanctioned and hired under the Housing for All plans.