Peadar Tóibín (Meath West, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

I want to put some human faces on the crisis that the Government has in large part created. I have changed the names of some of the individuals, obviously. One of the problems with the housing and homelessness crisis is that so many people do not want their names mentioned or their faces put to these issues. It is quite shocking that the responsible Minister is not in the Chamber to listen to this debate. We do not have the Minister, Deputy Kelly, or the Minister of State, Deputy Coffey, at the Department of the Environment, Community and Local Government. Given that they are the Ministers supposedly in control - which is very debatable - they should at least be here to hear the discussion.

These are some of the cases I am dealing with in my own constituency at the moment. Tom and his partner are both in their 20s. She is 32 weeks pregnant. They have a total income of €200 a week. They are each on a jobseeker's payment of €100 and they pay €25 each to the council to live in their parents' seriously overcrowded house. They are trying to find a house but cannot. They cannot save for a house or for the imminent arrival of their new baby. Even with their income and rent supplement, every landlord in the county knows they simply do not have the money to rent any accommodation.

Caitríona was transferred to Meath from another county by Women's Aid for her own safety. She cannot go back to her county because she is danger. The council will not accept her housing needs, so the refuge can no longer fund her place. My office spent most of today ringing the Department and the council to see if we could get her some level of accommodation. Today Caitríona is on the streets because there is no place for her at the moment.

Sorcha is living in a bed and breakfast since May with her partner and young kids. This is the second time she has been homeless in the last while. Her older kids are staying with relations. She has a young daughter who, at six years old, has changed school three times. Because of that forced change, her parents see that she is now having major difficulties building friendships with the kids in her class, as she is unsure how long her new school is going to last.

The family is on the telephone all day but nobody is getting back to them.

Fionn and Sonia are 55 years of age. They worked all their lives to make a living. Sonia has just become sick and Fionn is now her carer. Their home is being sold and they cannot find anywhere else to live. While the family is suffering from sickness, they are showing people around the house from which they will be evicted very shortly.

Eilis and Eoin have been waiting 12 years for a house. They have been sleeping in a tent in the Ramparts in Navan, a walk the Minister of State will know because I have met him there previously. That is not a safe place for anybody after dark. They have been in bed and breakfast accommodation and other accommodation that was just not safe.

This is another issue. Councils rely on accommodation for people who are homeless that is in poor condition. Councils feel they have no choice but to use it because if they take this poor-quality accommodation out of circulation, as should be the case in normal circumstances, there will be no place for these individuals to go. I know of another individual in his 60s named Seán who is very ill. He has multiple tumours and limited mobility and has been put into bed and breakfast accommodation. He has now been told to move to the homeless hostel in Drogheda. Noeleen is expected to live in her ex-partner's parents' house. She feels really unwelcome in that house but she has nowhere else to bring her children. She cannot get another house because she is deemed to be accommodated at the moment. Rita has seven children who are living in three different houses because she cannot find a single house for them. She is travelling the country bringing them to school and picking them up.

This is the hidden homelessness that exists in counties around the greater Dublin area. There are dozens of families who are simply trying to find a place to live. One in six mortgages in Meath is in distress, which is a major cause of homelessness. A total of 4,500 people are on the waiting list in Meath while 700 people presented as homeless in the county last year. There is no homeless shelter for men in the county at the moment while women must go to the refuge. This puts pressure on the refuge because it has less space for its intended use. Rents in Meath have increased by 13% to 14% under this Government. According to EUROSTAT, Meath is one of the places where rent is highest as a proportion of income.

What have the Labour Party and Fine Gael done to try to fix this in our county? With 4,500 people on the housing waiting list, their objective is to have 133 new properties in circulation in the county by 2017 through acquisitions and building. That is an abysmal effort compared with the size of the crisis in Meath. On 2 September, I, along with a number of Deputies, met in the county council office to discuss the humanitarian crisis in County Meath, although the Labour Party Deputy did not make it. I put forward a motion that the Minister for the Environment, Community and Local Government meet the elected representatives in Meath to discuss the homelessness and housing crisis. Ninety days later, the Minister's response to the elected representatives in Meath has been zero. Not only has he not been here, he will not sit in a room with the elected representatives in Meath to discuss the housing crisis. That is not a snub to me. What the Minister thinks of or says or does not say to me is neither here nor there. It is a snub to the thousands of people we represent in County Meath and a direct snub to people on the margins of existence with regard to housing and homelessness in my county. That the Minister has not even rung to say he will meet us on a particular date shows a phenomenal level of arrogance. I appeal to the Minister of State, who is in an adjoining constituency that shares some services with Meath, to talk to the Minister and to ask him to discuss these issues the people of Meath. It is very important that the Government focuses on housing and homelessness in Meath and throughout the country. I appeal to it to put the proper investment into it.

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