Catherine Connolly (Galway West, Independent) | Oireachtas source

The number of homeless persons in Galway stands at 199, which does not include those staying in refuges, sleeping on couches in other people's homes and so forth. Let me deal with facts. I am a pragmatic and realistic woman and asking the Government to take action immediately, not to build houses tomorrow. I also ask it to take action in respect of the developer-led development of sites in Galway city that will result in 2,600 jobs for office workers in a multi-storey complex and not one single home. I ask it to take action on the absence of a local area plan and a master plan for brownfield sites in the city that are being sold, principally at Ceannt Station and in the docks. I ask it to take action to deal with flagrant non-compliance with the city development plan, the Government's national planning framework, with which I am familiar, and all of the national planning guidelines. We have a housing crisis, but we also have public land in the hands of various public agencies. When office accommodation and not one home is to be built for 2,600 people, not only do we have a scandal on our hands, but it is also clear that we have not learned anything from this debacle. I again ask the Tánaiste to listen on the issues I raise and act on them. I am not asking that houses be constructed tomorrow but that the Government ask serious questions about why there is no interconnecting plan for lands that would solve or partly solve the housing crisis in Galway in the next few years through the building of homes.

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