Micheál Martin (Cork South Central, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

The legislation the Government has introduced applies until January and it protects tenants who are in difficulty because of the Covid-19 crisis in terms of income and so on. It protects them from rent increases and eviction. It is a more specific Bill than that which preceded it. The reason the blanket ban could not be continued is that, fundamentally, it was unconstitutional. We were no longer at the time and are no longer now in a lockdown situation. Dublin is not in lockdown. Level 3 is not lockdown. All sectors are open, bar the hospitality area generally and some areas of arts, culture and entertainment. Manufacturing is open, retail is open and construction is open. Significant sectors of the economy are still operating in Dublin.

We hope it does not happen but if we were to move to level 4 and level 5, one would have to consider what additional measures one could bring in to support people in situations like the Deputies have described. For now, the advice is very clear in respect of level 3. The Minister is of the view, in accordance with the legal advice, that level 3 does not merit the reintroduction of the blanket ban that was there for some months during the lockdown and all that went with the lockdown in terms of restricted mobility throughout the entire country. There is a significant difference between the two. Of that there is no doubt and it must be accepted.

Regarding Deputy Kelly's question on voids, the Government has only been in office for three months, give or take a week or two, but we have taken the initiative in this regard. It is the case that for some time there have been a number of empty houses and homes that were not refurbished quickly enough. I made that point to the new Minister for Housing, Planning and Local Government and the Secretary General of the Department that local authorities need to move quickly when houses are vacated to get them back into operation without delay.

The length of time it can take to get a house that has been vacated back up and running with a new family or person in it is ridiculous. We all hear anecdotally of cases where all the furniture in a house is taken out and it is boarded up. That is not acceptable in a housing crisis where people are desperately looking for houses. The Minister with responsibility for housing and I took the initiative to provide substantial moneys from the July stimulus to get voids back in use quickly. Some 2,500 voids will be delivered back into the housing stock as a result of that initiative, which was taken weeks after the Government was formed with a view to doing something concrete about voids quickly with the resources allocated to it. The Minister, with the local authorities, has put a lot of energy into trying to realise those particular targets.

I dealt with the issue Deputy McDonald raised on level 3 restrictions versus a lockdown. Even looking at the August return, one can see that, bar some specific sectors, significant sectors of the economy have come back fairly strongly since the reopening. We suffered a lot with construction unemployment and other areas because of the severity of our lockdown in March and April. A number of articles have been written on that but, nonetheless, that lockdown had the effect of suppressing the virus so one must look at this in the longer term.

The same point I articulated on the legislation we have brought in applies to the question put by Deputy Boyd Barrett. As I said, the Minister is examining what additional targeted measures may be required in the event that an area is subject to level 4 or level 5 restrictions in line with Resilience and Recovery 2020-2021: Plan for Living with Covid-19 and we will continue to examine that.

On homelessness, the Minister has been very committed from the get-go to working with the various non-governmental organisations involved in homelessness, providing supports to those who intervene in homelessness to get the figures down, create additional accommodation in emergency accommodation in particular and keep downward pressure on homelessness as much as we possibly can. That is continuing across a range of initiatives the Minster has taken on a short-term, medium-term and long-term basis, with a view to getting additional capacity for emergency accommodation in the short term.

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