Richard Boyd Barrett (Dún Laoghaire, People Before Profit Alliance) | Oireachtas source

If, as we must, we are going to provide refuge for those fleeing the war in Ukraine, we need to do everything we can to relieve pressure on the housing services. A simple measure I suggested to the Minister for Housing, Local Government and Heritage when he was looking for suggestions a number of weeks ago was to stop evictions, as we did during the Covid-19 emergency. The numbers of evictions are rising and that is increasing the number of people and families going into homeless services who should not be there. It is putting more and more pressure on our housing services.

Similarly, on the issue of vacant buildings, we wrote weeks ago suggesting specific buildings in my constituency that might be suitable.

We have heard absolutely nothing about what the Government intends to do to put those buildings to use for those affected both by the refugee crisis and the housing crisis.

See this speech in context