Joan Collins (Dublin South Central, Independent) | Oireachtas source

If the 158 rough sleepers said tonight that they need emergency beds, is there capacity in the system to provide them? That is a simple question.

The Minister of State commented on the claims by the Inner City Helping Homeless group. Its lead team made contact by phone on four separate occasions and was told no bed was available. It is not right to dismiss the claims of such a group that is out on the streets every single night. It can get the recording of the telephone calls, during which it was explicitly stated that there were no beds were available. If that was the case - I think it was because I know a woman who is involved and I do not think she would say it otherwise - then there is a problem and we must find out what happened and try to address the issue. One of the reasons I wanted to raise the matter today is that if there is a fault in the system we must be big enough to be prepared to find out what went wrong and to deal with it.

The situation involving Peter McVerry is horrendous. The man walked off and Peter McVerry tried to ring him back but he must have noted an incorrect digit when taking down the phone number because there was no reply. In severe cold weather conditions such as those being experienced at the moment, hostels should be open all day. People have to leave approximately 150 beds at 8 a.m. and come back at 9 p.m. In severe weather conditions such as we have now, however, they should be open for 24 hours a day and at weekends in order to respond to the situation. There should also be an access point in the city centre where people can go to try to get accommodation rather than having to use phones. There are only six telephone boxes in the inner city area. We must address such issues. We should make every effort to get the responders and outreach teams to try to convince as many people as possible to come in because the conditions are serious and people could die as a result. The State must up its game in terms of the services provided for rough sleepers in order that people will not be fearful going into hostels when they need to access them.

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