Ivana Bacik (Dublin Bay South, Labour) | Oireachtas source

We in the Labour Party are calling for the Government to introduce an immediate ban on evictions to protect renters and stop people from entering homelessness this winter as we face into a bleak winter ahead. We are seeing with alarming frequency distressing stories of families literally left out in the cold. We have seen just this week reports of a family sleeping in a tent in Herbert Park in our own constituency. We in the Labour Party have called on the Government to grasp the nettle on housing. We simply have not seen sufficiently urgent action. We did welcome the endowing of local authorities with powers to allow them to buy rental properties and to keep renters in a home when the landlord chooses to sell, but whenever families contact me who are facing eviction, I have yet to see that policy having positive effect for them. We need to see more radical and urgent action taken by the Government, and we need to see a temporary but immediate ban on evictions to protect renters and protect families facing eviction this winter.

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