Tommy Broughan (Dublin North East, Independent) | Oireachtas source

Since 2011 the Government has slashed significantly the total amounts of rent supplement. The tenancy sustainable protocol in January was welcome and has helped. The previous reply we got in the House from the Minister stated that 500 families had been uplifted at that time. That was a few weeks ago. However, I would like to know the numbers of those who were refused. The Minister did not recognise that the Department did not have a legal leg to stand on in relation to uplifts and market rents, which is why the sustainability protocol emerged. Making a family homeless through lack of support of rent supplement was not an option to the Minister, even though she slashed it by hundreds of millions of euro in the past four years.

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