Eoghan Murphy (Dublin Bay South, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I move amendment No. 1:

To delete all words after "That" and substitute the following:

Dáil Éireann declines to give the Thirty-fifth Amendment of the Constitution (Right to Housing) Bill 2017 a second reading and instead, taking account of previous Government decisions to have the broader recommendations in the Eighth Report of the Convention on the Constitution (i.e. that the State shall progressively realise economic, social and cultural (ESC) rights subject to maximum available resources and that this duty shall be cognisable by the Courts, and that specific additional rights should also be inserted into the Constitution of Ireland, including housing rights, social security rights, essential health care, rights of people with disabilities, linguistic and cultural rights) considered by an Oireachtas Committee, have the right-to-housing issue considered by the Oireachtas Committee on Finance, Public Expenditure and Reform, and Taoiseach, to review the implications arising in terms of balance of rights, good governance (including the separation of powers) and resource prioritisation."

I welcome the opportunity to discuss this important issue. I do not doubt the sincerity of the Deputies proposing this Bill for a constitutional amendment to the House. It is important that, as Parliament, we debate issues and take a rights-based approach to our debates. It is an important function of what we do. I am not ignoring anybody, Deputy Boyd Barrett. I am not ignoring the voluntary sector. I work with it every day of the week. A great deal of money is funnelled through the voluntary sector to provide these important services to people who need them. If the Deputy proposes to take its advice on this particular issue, in terms of this constitutional amendment, he must also take its advice in terms of welcoming the outcomes from the recent housing summit. The Deputy cannot have it both ways.

Ireland's housing emergency is more than six years old: it stretches back at least two decades. It is a long time since we had a functioning housing market in this country. Fine Gael did not abandon the construction of social housing but it is taking it back as a priority of this Government. I am not dismissing the Bill. It merits further consideration and I mean that genuinely. I do not dismiss the importance of debating or deciding a rights-based approach to the provision of public goods. I have said a number of times that I have left ideology at the door as I address this crisis. That is not to suggest that there should not be a policy or a political philosophical underpinning to our actions but I would rather set down some key principles that would guide us as a Government, principles that would out-live whatever Minister is in charge of the particular brief. In regard to the principle that social housing should not be outsourced to the private sector, I believe in that. That was a mistake of the past, one which this Government is committed to undoing. I will focus all of my efforts in regard to social housing provision on direct build by local authorities and housing bodies. In regard to Part V and void conversions, these are treated as a bonus figure so that we are not relying again on the private sector to meet our social housing needs.

I also believe in the principle that a percentage of new stock in any given year should be social housing. That is an important principle. In terms of the houses that will be built next year between the public and private sectors, between one quarter and one fifth of them will be social housing homes newly built by local authorities and housing bodies. A conservative projection is that 20,000 new homes will be built next year between the private and public sectors, 3,800 of which will be built by local authorities and housing bodies, with 1,200 delivered through Part V and void conversions, voids that have not been in use for many years. That is not a small thing when one considers where we have come from, which basically was zero building either in the private sector or the public sector.

The Housing Agency has stated that we need to build 25,000 new homes every year. This is what is required in a steady state. Next year, we will build 20,000 new homes and we will use vacancy and other measures to deal with pent up demand and to get other forms of housing into the market. I have no objection to using compulsory purchase orders. I have asked the Attorney General to look at this proposal to ensure that local authorities in moving to use CPOs can be confident that they can use them to get homes back into use. This is not about the State trying to take someone's property. It is about ensuring houses are brought back into use as homes to meet the crisis we are facing.

Deputy Barry Cowen has said that the crisis we currently face in housing is beyond party politics. I agree with him. I hope that we can all rise to meet that challenge and, working together, come up with constructive proposals for our citizens who need homes. It must be recognised that a significant amount of work is being done. It must also be recognised that new homes are being built, because they are. I recognise also that we need more houses to be built more quickly and, crucially, as the Deputies opposite have pointed out, we need more affordable homes - affordable to build, affordable to buy and affordable to rent.

There are now 1,500 families being supported in emergency accommodation. One family in emergency accommodation is one family too many but thankfully we have been able to direct our resources to help those families out of hotels and into hubs and social housing homes, HAP-supported tenancies and more permanent forms of accommodation. Approximately €25 million will be spent this year on moving families from hotels and bed and breakfast accommodation into family hubs, with all of the supports and wrap around services they need. An additional €10 million has been provided, which will be drawn down and a further €10 million is in place as a contingency, if we can get those hubs in place before the end of the year. The hubs are working. If Deputies visit them they will see this. Families are better off in hubs and they are moving quickly out of them into more permanent forms of housing. Different families have different needs and we must be sensitive to those needs. Some families will be in hubs longer than we would like but we must be sensitive to their concerns.

Unfortunately we have also heard of recent deaths of individuals who were homeless and using homeless emergency services. They died for different reasons in very different circumstances. I know it has been a very difficult time for their families and for our emergency care works who are on the front line. We can try to make available every possible resource, and we do, and we can try to do all that we can. Sometimes it is not enough but that does not mean we should not keep trying, and we do. I am pleased to confirm that following on from the recent housing summit, an additional 200 emergency beds will be in place before the end of the year. We now have a national director for Housing First coming online with an additional 100 Housing First places outside Dublin. We have new exit co-ordinators for homeless people to prevent them falling back into homelessness, which is very welcome, and we have a new interagency team to manage all of the different supports that are being put in place to help people beyond their housing needs, including health, mental health and other needs.

Our budget for homelessness has more than doubled since 2014, and rightly so.

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