Richard Bruton (Dublin Bay North, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

As I indicated to Deputy Lisa Chambers, this problem requires a short, medium and long-term solution. The Minister has introduced a strategy that is barely six months old and it is already having an impact. The first step was to increase emergency accommodation. There are 250 extra beds and 2,000 emergency beds in Dublin. We have had to step up the provision for emergency accommodation but it is very much an interim measure. The Deputy knows that the programme commits that by the middle of this year, there will no longer be families in bed and breakfast-type accommodation. There is a very clear commitment and although there is a transition, we are moving on.

The Minister has also dealt with the point of rent certainty. We now have in place caps on rents in Dublin and Cork that will later extend to additional areas. Most important, the Minister has committed to a supply line that we have not had for public housing. As I indicated to Deputy Chambers, there will be 47,000 social homes. We are also extending the housing assistance payment, HAP, which despite the suggestions from one source today accommodated 12,000 families last year. This is working and the HAP homeless element accommodated 550 families in Dublin. This is working but we must continually roll it out. It will be extended, as the Deputy knows, in March.

With sites such as the one at Oscar Traynor Road in my constituency, under the Minister's plan, that site, which has been derelict for 40 years in public ownership, will be built upon. We will have affordable rental homes, social homes, starter homes and a variety of houses supplied to the market to meet the huge needs we all know about. The alternative strategy of sitting on our hands, as we have done for 40 years, and the site has been derelict for that time, is not a solution to the housing crisis. We are moving to get building happening. There is a welcome rise in housing starts in Dublin and we need to build on that. The Minister's strategy is committed to that approach.

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