Joan Burton (Dublin West, Labour) | Oireachtas source

As I mentioned previously in the House, I met at length last week with a number of the organisations that are working very hard to address issues relating to homelessness. I use this opportunity to stress again that if there is anyone out there, particularly families with children but also anyone else, who has a difficulty around rents or tenancies and fears that he or she is at risk of homelessness, I ask him or her to contact the local Intreo social welfare office to seek an appointment with the community welfare service. At this point in time, we have a protocol we operate with organisations such as Threshold, Simon and Focus Ireland on a country-wide basis in co-operation with local authorities to provide an extensive one-to-one service to help people who are at risk of becoming homeless, who are homeless or who have difficulty renegotiating rent or a tenancy. The protocol is working extremely well and we have extended it right around the country and it is available nationally. It is working very well in Cork because of the dedication of the public servants operating the system and of the voluntary organisations, particularly Simon in Cork, in seeking to access accommodation for people. I use this opportunity to stress to all Members that the service is available and that it can respond extremely quickly. However, it means that people must actually go and utilise it. Where we have mobile phone numbers, which we do in many cases, we send out regular texts to remind people that if they have a difficulty with housing and they contact the community welfare service in their local Intreo office, they will receive help and advice. We have done that in a large number of cases.

On the overall issue of housing supply, the only way that will be addressed is by increasing the number of houses being built and the number of houses available to local authorities. Unfortunately, under the previous Government, the building of local authority accommodation came to a standstill because the policy of the Green Party and Fianna Fáil was to rely almost entirely on the private sector.

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