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

I raise the same issue with the Minister. We have a crisis now in emergency accommodation for people fleeing the terrible war in Ukraine and other wars and conflicts around the world. We should not distinguish between people suffering in horrendous circumstances or conflicts anywhere in the world. We also have, however, our own homelessness and housing crisis. It all points to the fact that we have to do more and we have to plan.

The simple thing that should be done, which we have been calling for, is that all evictions into homelessness should stop now. This is an emergency and emergency measures need to be taken to get into use vacant houses and properties that are littering the towns and cities of this country. These are being sat on with no justification in many places.

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