Éamon Ó Cuív (Galway West, Fianna Fail)
Link to this: Individually | In context | Oireachtas source

I will start with Cork. I welcome the progress made on Spring Lane but the obvious question that arises in my mind is when the problem commenced. When did the council know Spring Lane was deficient and substandard? How many years has it taken to get from there to here? I agree with consultation but there is also a reality if it goes on and on. Every night the consultation is going on, somebody is sleeping and living in cold, miserable conditions. It is important to understand when this started.

When the consultation was going on, the council would have had a fair idea of the shape of what it was going to do. There should have been, as far as possible, parallel processes going on. I deal with many Travellers and the one thing they want is a decent roof over their heads. Mr. Geaney is saying the council will commence Part VIII. Can he confirm it is Part VIII and not any other planning process that is involved? What happens if the Part VIII goes to the council and the elected members decide to defer or not to pass? The chief executive has the power to overrule that and just get on with it. What assurances will we get here today? I keep thinking of the Travellers in this area living in substandard conditions, going to bed every night and getting up every morning to substandard conditions. I do not think any of us would like to live in those conditions.

Has the council done an inventory of Traveller trailers in the city, an audit to find out the number that are substandard? I define "substandard" as meaning ones that are patently substandard but, as well as that, any that are more than seven years old. Any trailer more than seven years old does not have the thermal qualities required for 365-day living. We need to know. I do not buy into this thing about rationing it out from Dublin. I have fought this endlessly in the Dáil and in this committee. It is rationing out what should be a fundamental right to a decent place to live. It is very small money nationally because Travellers are a very small community nationally and many Travellers live in standard or purpose-built housing. A very small percentage of a very small population live in trailers but they are entitled, like everybody else, to a decent roof. This is a problem we could solve in one year.

Second, what is the view on the amount of the loan, which I understand is €40,000, that only buys a second-hand trailer? If we take it that a trailer has a seven-year life, buying a three-year-old trailer means it has a four-year life and we have to come back again to have another long battle to get trailers. What is the view on the amount and fact that it does not buy a new trailer and have any representations or submissions been made to the Department outlining the fact that this amount is totally inadequate? Has the issue of a standard rent been discussed? Is there a differential loan on these trailers or is it standardised at €20? What happens if there is a fixed building, as is the case on some halting site where a fixed building is attached to trailer? They are paying rent on the fixed part of it. Some of them have a kind of kitchen and whatever that is fixed, and they sleep in the trailer attached to it. Is double rent payable in that case? I know technically it is a loan but, at the end of day, it is money out of the community's pocket. I am delighted the local authority said that the €40,000 is insufficient. We back it the whole way on that issue because it has been raised time and again at this committee and in the Dáil. Does the local authority agree that this should be sorted in just one go - audit, assess and get it - and be done with this issue of substandard trailers once and for all? Money is being spent, rightly, on housing but as a proportion of the total housing, this is minuscule. This is a solvable problem, one that can be solved very fast because this does not take massive years of planning permission and so on, but could be done in a very short timeframe. Much of the problem up here at the moment is not about getting money. For a long time, getting money was the problem. The problem often now with capital expenditure is getting it spent.

I live in the neighbouring county very near the border with County Mayo. On the front page of the council's report, it states 175 traveller households are living in other accommodation. In the appendix I see there is one halting site in the county - in Castlebar as I understand it.