Joan Burton (Dublin West, Labour) | Oireachtas source

On behalf of the Labour Party, I wish Donal Hickey and his family every happiness in his retirement.

Given his previous portfolio, how concerned is the Tánaiste about the fact that today there are almost 4,000 children homeless out of the 10,000 people who are homeless? In the Dublin area and I think parts of Cork, where a lot of people are renting, landlords are increasingly selling their houses because they have come out of negative equity and the bank may well be forcing them to sell. The consequence is that very often there is no place for the family and the children to go to, except into homelessness. I am really shocked by Fine Gael's failure on this issue, that notwithstanding the fact that in my constituency there are many homes being built-----

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