Jan O'Sullivan (Limerick City, Labour) | Oireachtas source

I thank Deputy Maureen O'Sullivan for raising this issue. I have just come from Blessington Street, in her own constituency, where the Simon Community was opening a homeless facility for 12 people with support. I agree with her that good work is certainly being done by a number of voluntary housing associations.

It is never acceptable to have people sleeping on the streets. At this time of the year, more than any other, we seem to recognise a problem that endures throughout the year, every year. My Department's role involves providing a national framework of policy, legislation and funding to underpin the role of housing authorities in addressing homelessness at local level. Statutory responsibility in regard to the provision of accommodation and related services for homeless people rests with the housing authorities. The implementation of the homeless strategy at local and regional level is being carried out through the framework of statutory homelessness action plans adopted by housing authorities.

The stubbornly high number of rough sleepers in Dublin, as reported by Dublin City Council recently, reflects the gravity of the challenge facing the Government, the voluntary sector and other agencies in tackling the homelessness problem. I have sought to put in place real solutions for people who find themselves without a home. Investment of almost €50 million has been provided by central and local government in the provision of homeless services in 2012.

Rough sleeping is monitored closely countrywide but particularly in Dublin where the problem is most prevalent. The Dublin region's outreach team works on an ongoing basis to engage with all individuals sleeping rough, with the specific goal of moving people into accommodation through the Dublin City Council central placement service. The problem of rough sleeping is limited outside Dublin, with Cork, Waterford, Limerick, and Galway city councils reporting sufficient bed capacity on a nightly basis and that no one is sleeping rough due to the lack of a bed. The rough sleeper count for Cork, as reported recently in the media, does not appear to be consistent with the figures supplied by the Cork region's outreach team. Those figures report two to three rough sleepers in Cork.

Unfortunately, housing authorities consistently report the existence of a small number of entrenched rough sleepers who are unwilling to avail of accommodation. I take the Deputy's point that sometimes the accommodation may not be appropriate, particularly if there is drug taking involved and they are trying to avoid certain behaviour. This group has been particularly difficult to engage with due to mental health issues and aggressive behaviour. Outreach teams continue to try to provide solutions for this group and to encourage these persons to avail of accommodation. Where they refuse to do so, outreach teams ensure that they have sufficient food and bedding.

Progress has been made in the area of homelessness but unfortunately that is not enough. The recent Dublin figures are a stark reminder of the complexity of the homelessness issue and the difficulties in finding answers to it. It is not tolerable that anyone should sleep on the streets. It is not good enough and we cannot sit idly by.

One of my priorities is to ensure that homeless people have access to secure, stable and appropriate accommodation. Short-term interventions are not a long-term solution to homelessness. We need to continue to focus on long-term solutions to homelessness. I acknowledge, however, that we do need a level of short-term accommodation for urgent situations.

The community and voluntary sector has a critical role to play in dealing with homelessness, especially so in these difficult times. I am especially pleased to see the agencies engaging in housing and resettlement solutions, in line with Government policy on housing-first and housing-led initiatives, rather than managing people in emergency accommodation. Fostering a resettlement culture that promotes independent living is the key to tackling homelessness.

It is important that any initiative dealing with homelessness should be progressed in collaboration with the relevant regional homeless consultative fora. They were specifically established to allow the community and voluntary sector to work in partnership with the State sector in progressing initiatives to overcome homelessness, and to ensure that such initiatives do not disadvantage other persons in need of housing. These fora consist of individuals with particular expertise relevant to the implementation of homeless initiatives.

The annual provision of current funding from the Department should provide for sufficient bed capacity to accommodate all those in need of emergency accommodation nationwide. I acknowledge that, sadly, there are still people on the streets.

Deputy O'Sullivan sought figures and, as she knows, the rough sleepers count takes place regularly. There are also figures on homelessness from the Central Statistics Office that arise from the census, but they do not always tally with some of the data we get from local authorities. There is therefore some work to do in determining exactly who is homeless and who should be counted in the figures. I acknowledge that we need to do some more work on that.

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