Mick Wallace (Wexford, Independent) | Oireachtas source

When the Government talks about figures, it is difficult to see the clarity. It always talks about local authorities and approved housing bodies. I honestly think we must be specific and say we need local authority social housing. How many local authority social housing new builds were delivered in the past four years and how many will be delivered up to 2020? I know of a Roma family with four children under four years of age who are looking for a house in Wexford. They cannot get private rented accommodation. The local authority does not have a unit to give to them. It is not possible. One can say there is no appetite for it at local authority level. There is a serious lack of funding there. We have a substantial problem and unless there is a will and an ideology that favours the local authority again playing that major role in providing social housing, we will continue to have this problem.

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