Michael Harty (Clare, Independent) | Oireachtas source

There will be 47,000 new social houses provided under the housing action plan. By providing 2% of those, 1,000 families with children in homelessness could be taken out of that condition. It is quite unbelievable that in Ireland in 2016, the number of homeless children is increasing month after month, now exceeding 2,200. Homelessness is a deeply unhealthy state, particularly for children, and it is completely unacceptable in a modern society that this should be the case. Child homelessness is a social and political failure. This Government's response to child homelessness should be the issue on which this Government stands or dies, not water or bin charges, which pale into insignificance when compared with not having a home at all. I request that the Minister devote her time and energy to eliminating child homelessness before Christmas.

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