Eoin Ó Broin (Dublin Mid West, Sinn Fein)

I thank the local authorities and the ombudsman's office for their work, especially the work of their front-line staff. I acknowledge that.

I have three questions for the DRHE and three questions for Dr. Muldoon and his team. A sum of €355 million for homeless services, predominantly emergency accommodation, is a huge amount of money. Does Ms Hayes have a breakdown of that spend in terms of how much is going into private emergency accommodation versus the not-for-profit providers? She recently provided some information to me on request on what the cost would be if a family with a three- or four-bedroom need presented for emergency accommodation now, given that it would be private emergency accommodation. Will she share that and an explanation for it with the committee? I note that at the end of her presentation she referenced the potential move to directly fund the building or acquisition of Dublin city owned emergency accommodation. Does that send a signal there is no expectation that levels of homelessness are likely to decrease any time soon? In fact, they may get worse.

One of the words Dr. Muldoon used for the impact of homelessness on children was "catastrophic". I am sure he did not use it lightly. Does he think we are at risk of normalising homelessness? Month on month, the numbers come out and are reported on with less attention than previously. Does he have a concern that some recent changes, for example, reductions in funding for tenant in situ, missed social housing new-build targets, or some of the changes to the rent pressure zones and the commentary by organisations such as Focus Ireland, could have a negative impact on the number of children in emergency accommodation? Does he have any comment on the fact that the Housing (Miscellaneous Provisions) Act, in its most recent form, is not addressing the issue of the rights of the child he and others have highlighted?