Damien English (Meath West, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

Since Christmas alone, more than 600 people who presented as homeless have secured HAP tenancies and are in a much better position than they were previously.

I thank the Deputies for raising this important issue and welcome the opportunity to clarify the position regarding what was a very distressing situation for all concerned. The Government is absolutely committed to addressing the issue of homelessness. There is now a focused and co-ordinated approach to tackling it across multiple Departments and agencies.

As Deputies are aware, Rebuilding Ireland: Action Plan on Housing and Homelessness launched in July last year provides a multi-stranded, action orientated approach to achieving the Government's key housing objectives and tackling homelessness in a comprehensive manner once and for all.

It is important to make clear that statutory responsibility for the provision emergency accommodation to homeless services rests with individual housing authorities. The Department's role involves the provision of a national framework of policy, legislation and funding to underpin the role of housing authorities in addressing homelessness at local level. Consequently, it does not play a role in operational issues.

When a family presents as homeless out of hours in Dublin, the dedicated family homeless action team will work with the family to secure hotel accommodation for the night, with a more detailed assessment of the family's requirements taking place the next day. The family homeless action team is provided through Focus Ireland, which is funded by the four Dublin local authorities to provide this valuable service.

Regarding the events that occurred in Dublin city on Tuesday night, 24 May, I understand that the demand for emergency accommodation was at unprecedented levels and there was a scarcity of available hotel or bed and breakfast accommodation. As a consequence, Focus Ireland was unable to source hotel accommodation for all of the families that had been referred to it that night. Dublin City Council's central placement service maintains a number of contingency spaces for families that are intended for use only in absolute emergencies when families present out of hours and no commercial accommodation can be secured. I understand that, when the homeless action team was unable to source hotel accommodation on Tuesday, these contingency spaces were brought into play. Given the unprecedented demand that night, however, these spaces were soon fully utilised, with a number of families remaining unaccommodated. Accordingly, and in line with agreed working arrangements, Focus Ireland referred the remaining families to Garda stations as a last resort and with a view to their safety.

I understand that the issue of contingency capacity for families was on Dublin City Council's agenda prior to Tuesday night and that the council had been working to increase the volume of its contingency spaces to 14 family units. Unfortunately, this additional capacity only came on stream on Wednesday night. While that was a day too late for the families in question, it is of some reassurance that this additional capacity now exists within the system.

I have made it clear that I do not consider hotel accommodation to be appropriate for families for anything other than a short period. The Minister has been clear on this as well and has committed to end the use of hotels. The events of Tuesday night highlight that a reliance on hotel accommodation is not only inappropriate, but precarious. It was with this understanding that Rebuilding Ireland included an explicit commitment to ensure that, by mid-2017, hotels would only be relied on for emergency accommodation in limited circumstances. To meet this objective, there has been a focus on meeting families' long-term housing needs through housing supports such as the enhanced HAP scheme and general social housing allocations. Significant outputs are being achieved in this regard and housing authorities achieved more than 3,000 sustainable exits from homeless accommodation into independent tenancies during 2016, which was a record level of exits in a calendar year.

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