Mary Fitzpatrick (Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I will give Senator Cummins a moment to take his place.

I ask Mr. Kelly to return to the issue of the over-concentration in Dublin Central for a moment. I appreciate that local authorities are independent bodies, having been a member myself and fully respecting of their authority. It is really important that the Government at a national level does not interfere with the operation of the local authorities. However, this committee believes that the Department can play a significant role in terms of policy and funding in addressing what is a real issue in Dublin Central. It is probably a unique situation in the country. A total of 70% of all of the emergency accommodation is in Dublin with 70% of that is in Dublin Central. For the individuals who are being accommodated in that accommodation, it is short term. It is temporary. It is not the type of accommodation that lends itself to having a proper home life. We believe as a committee that the Department take a lead role in driving that, particularly through the committee within the Department that has all of the stakeholders involved. I would appreciate it if Mr. Kelly would take that on board. When we return to this subject in the future, we definitely want to see some progress on that.

Deputy Gould has returned. I will restore the Deputy his time. I think he had approximately three minutes.