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

I would like to thank Deputy Fitzpatrick for raising this issue with me today. One of the key commitments in Rebuilding Ireland is to help homeless families and children exit homelessness and move into independent tenancies. The housing assistance payment forms a key element of the Government's response to achieving this.

HAP is a flexible and immediate form of social housing support, enabling households to choose where they wish to live. The national roll-out of the HAP scheme was completed in 2017, and HAP is now available in 31 local authorities. It is working quite well in counties like Meath and Louth and in Fingal and other areas that were mentioned here today. There were 31,200 households supported by the scheme by the end of 2017, with a target of an additional 17,000 households during 2018.

One of the measures put in place in early 2017 to support families through the use of HAP was the establishment of a homeless HAP place finders service in the Dublin Region Homeless Executive, which leads the response to homelessness in the four Dublin local authorities and in Cork. The homeless HAP service supports families in emergency accommodation by nominating them to viewings with the place finder service and encouraging and supporting them in finding private rented accommodation. More than 2,000 families are being supported by the scheme.

The scheme has had success in Dublin, Cork, and the Fingal area referenced by Deputy Fitzpatrick, where the housing team has done great work. Likewise, the housing team in County Louth are doing great work, providing housing solutions for many people who are homeless. Following this, the scheme was introduced to all local authorities earlier this year.

A critical aspect of the homeless HAP place finder scheme is the results that it is achieving in preventing families from entering emergency accommodation. For example, a family provided with a notice to quit from a tenancy can be supported by the local authority to secure a tenancy without ever having to enter homeless accommodation. Accordingly, the scheme is playing a vital role in prevention.

Preventing homelessness is a priority for the Government. Increasing inter-agency prevention efforts is a key function of the inter-agency group on homelessness, which was established by the Minister for Housing, Planning and Local Government, Deputy Eoghan Murphy, following the housing summit in September 2017. The group is chaired by Mr. John Murphy, a former Secretary General, and includes representation from the Department of Health, the HSE, Tusla, the Department of Justice and Equality and the Department of Children and Youth Affairs. The group is expected to make its first report to the Minister in the coming weeks.

Of course, delivering more social housing is critical to addressing homelessness, and my Department is working closely with local authorities to accelerate delivery. Last year an additional 7,000 new social houses were delivered across all schemes throughout the country, and this year we expect to have 8,000 new houses. That is in addition to the 17,000 HAP places that we hope to have as well.

While the level of homelessness remains a significant problem, solutions are being implemented. Over 4,000 exits from homelessness were achieved in 2017, and my Department is working to build on this in 2018. The homeless HAP place finder service will remain an integral part of our response, and will certainly help counties like Louth, Fingal and other areas to find accommodation for people who find themselves homeless.

I understand that there is a particular issue with the case Deputy Fitzpatrick has raised, and I am happy to discuss it with him. I have been assured by the officials in my Department that a solution can be reached. As Minister State, I commit to working with the Deputy and with the local teams in Louth and in Fingal, which are doing great work. We will find a solution for this family. I can assure this House of that.

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