Sorca Clarke (Longford-Westmeath, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

I thank the Chair for obliging Deputy Buckley and I so we can be here. It is much appreciated.

We are not going to get anywhere constructive, and it is indeed quite futile, to be having discussions at this juncture about what a report is or is not titled. We are here to discuss the report. We have witnesses here to outline their opinion on it. It is also important to say that if the Minister had acted on this we could have had a referendum this year, but he chose to sit on it. In the dying days of the Government here we are having a committee meeting when this should have been treated with a lot more seriousness at a much higher level - with all due respect to this committee - in the Dáil and Seanad Chambers.

I have a very straightforward question for Mr. Boyle and Mr. Stanley. Mr. Boyle said there were people who were fundamentally failed and I could not agree with him more. What came foremost to my mind was a family I am very well aware of. We have to talk about this as a State-wide issue. It is not through any mischievousness, but when we speak of a housing issue, a housing crisis and a shortage of houses we tend to focus on the very urban areas. My constituency is a rural one. We are as affected, if not more so, by the lack of appropriate housing. I am using the term "appropriate housing" in a very specific way in relation to this family because no matter what it is they do for their children with disabilities the goalposts are ever moving. They will get to one set and it will be moved again. They get to that one and it is moved again. This has been going on for years now. In that specific circumstance, what benefits do Mr. Boyle and Mr. Stanley see constitutional change having for them?