Mr. Mike Allen:

The situation the Senator describes happens. We experience it often. Deputy Ward and others asked about silos and how those operate. These are silos within local authorities. One side of the local authority says that accommodation is not good enough for people, so they have to move on, and then the local authority says that it does not have anything better for those people, so they have to stay in a place that is much worse than where they were. The practical solution would be a more integrated response from local authorities, geared around the needs of the family rather than the sets of rules that they have. These problems are going to arise. Many of the families stuck in homelessness for a long time are larger families. In the other area of homelessness, we are increasingly looking at the need to build one-bedroom units. We really need to see local authorities build, not a huge number, but significantly more three and four-bedroom social housing units to house people who the local authorities can readily see will need them. That is the medium to longer term solution that needs to be built into Housing for All. The shorter term requires better integration, more listening in Departments, and not letting the perfect constantly be the enemy of the decent. Unfortunately, some people live in poor circumstances rather than just difficult circumstances where they would be more secure.

Waterford County Council has a different way of doing this which we have written on in some cases. It uses its own housing stock for emergency accommodation. Clearly that is not possible in Dublin with the scale of the problem. It is somewhere to get to, where even if people become homeless, they do not end up in homeless accommodation but in something which looks like an ordinary house. They only stay there for a short time since they do not have a right to stay there. The harm that comes from living in unsuitable accommodation is removed from the system. All local authorities should look at it.