Simon Coveney (Cork South Central, Fine Gael)
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Sorry, I meant to answer the question on Traveller accommodation. The increase in the Estimate from last year to this in respect of Traveller accommodation is significant. It is an increase of approximately €1.5 million starting from a rather low base. The percentage increase is approximately 17%. It is important to put this into context because the actual figure in the Estimate is still relatively low, particularly in light of the issue that needs to be addressed. Let us consider an increase to €4.2 million from €3.6 million by comparison with the figures seven or eight years ago when there was a far greater figure for Traveller accommodation. That is because a policy decision was made to try to accommodate Traveller families within mainstream social housing solutions, whether HAP or the allocation of social and affordable housing or whatever. The idea was to try to mainstream solutions for Traveller families within the broader social housing provision. A considerable number of Traveller families will be on social housing lists, for example. They will be treated like others in terms of getting priority and so on.

We need to recognise that there are Traveller-specific accommodation needs as well. These include halting sites and other types of Traveller-specific accommodation designed to meet specific needs. We are looking at that figure for next year. I imagine we will have a debate on the budget, but we are looking at whether that figure needs to be increased significantly between now and next year or whether we want to maintain the approach of trying to deal predominantly with the needs of Traveller families through the general budget for social housing. How best to do that comes down to a question of judgment.