Mary Lou McDonald (Dublin Central, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

I listened carefully to what the caretaker Minister had to say. He urged us all to deal with the facts and then conveniently ignored them. These are the facts.

According to the Dublin Regional Homeless Executive, the number of new families who have become homeless increased from 41 in December to 125 this year. The fact is that in such a short time the number of families experiencing homelessness has trebled. These shocking figures stand beside other equally harrowing facts.

Approximately 5,715 people across the country are homeless, of whom more than 1,800 are children. Between 2014 and 2015 there was a 43% increase in the number of people recorded as homeless. That figure does not capture the entirety of the phenomenon of the number of people sleeping on couches, in box rooms or staying with friends or the real number of rough sleepers.

Figures for 2015 show that there were 117,000 mortgages in arrears. The number of buy-to-let properties in mortgage arrears remains at over 30,000. These are the facts as we meet in the 32nd Dáil.

The Minister posed the question: what should we do? The first step is to recognise the reality and the fact that we have not just a housing emergency but a humanitarian crisis in our cities and towns and on the streets. The second point concerns the need to take responsibility for this because it happened on the watch of the Minister, Deputy Alan Kelly, and that of previous Administrations.

The third step involves understanding fully the role of the State in resolving the crisis because just as Fianna Fáil in previous Governments was happy to hand over authority and responsibility solely and exclusively to its friends who were developers, the previous Government played footsie and similarly handed over responsibility to private landlords. That must stop. There must be a real recognition that the State must lead in making an investment in the provision of social and affordable housing. Unless and until we have an Administration that recognises that simple fact, none of the other initiatives the Minister cited will solve the problem.

The cowardly manner in which the previous Government allowed the banks to ride roughshod over mortgage holders and those in mortgage distress was an outrage. We should say here loudly and clearly from the floor of the 32nd Dáil that repossessions and evictions are not sustainable solutions. We should agree that much, if we can, if nothing else.

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