Paul Murphy (Dublin South West, Solidarity) | Oireachtas source

The fact we are having such a discussion on education provision for homeless children is a sign of the crisis we have in our society. The discussion has moved on from preventing homelessness because of the Government's inability to do it. It has moved to ensuring the children who are homeless have the least affected experience as possible. It is utterly scandalous.

Over Christmas I was contacted by a teacher in the constituency of the Minister for Housing, Planning and Local Government, Deputy Eoghan Murphy, who told me about a boy in his class. This boy had to have an operation, with eight teeth and a cyst removed. He needed somewhere to rest, recuperate and recover, according to the doctor's advice. Every day the boy turned up to school despite being unable to concentrate or pay attention. He had no choice because both he and his mother were living in emergency accommodation; there was a different bed and breakfast or hotel every day and they were turfed out every morning. He had no choice but to turn up to school, where he was utterly incapable of performing or achieving the required recovery. That is a result of the policies of this Government.

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How can he receive an education and recover in those circumstances when they were unable even to get the very basic access to a homeless hub, which would have at least meant that he had somewhere to rest and recuperate? The Government is responsible for that, not just in the Minister's own constituency but around the country with almost 4,000 children now homeless. The consequences are devastating for children like that boy but also in the long run in terms of the mental and physical impact on their health. Decades into the future, society will pay a price for the crisis that has been created.

When one talks to homeless families, one of the first things they will always say is how they are managing with their children. Often the tale is one of trekking across the city in the case of Dublin to bring their children to this school, that school or a couple of schools and getting up very early in the morning. There are tales of not being able to prepare food and wash clothes and the impact of all of that in terms of their children being tired and hungry and sometimes not being able to access clean uniforms.

I thought some of the quotes in the excellent study by the Children's Rights Alliance were very striking and very similar to the stories that come to me and, I am sure, to others. One person said:

I could survive and not eat in the morning. I would not eat in the afternoon and wait for evening. I could manoeuvre that but children, they have to eat and even if they eat, they're still saying "I'm hungry". I can't pay for a bus when he has to eat and we can only walk so far. Sometimes when there's no money in my hand, I'm like "we really have to walk right now, you know" He's an understanding boy because he could see the situation and we had to walk. They had said to me about him constantly trying to go to sleep at the table in school and then getting frustrated and then not listening to what the teachers were saying.

We hear story after story like that.

The Government recognised this problem and promised to fix it. In 2016, it said no children would be staying in bed and breakfasts or hotels by July 2017. In fact, the situation has got worse. The response of the Minister last week or the week before regarding this contradiction between the promise made by the Government and the reality was not to promise to try harder but to withdraw the promise. It was to say that it was irresponsible to promise to end homelessness and that homelessness will always be with us. It is utterly shameful.

The answer is simple. It involves rejecting the logic of market, which makes people homeless; proper rent controls; and investment in public housing. The one light we have seen in the past week or so is the victory of those who organised together to resist evictions in Leeside in Cork. It shows that if people get organised and fight, they can win victories. It is an inspiration to the people in Exchange Hall. There are many children among this group who are facing mass eviction in Tallaght. It gives them inspiration to get organised and have protests this weekend but they should not have to do this because the Government should be passing legislation to prevent any evictions into homelessness.

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