Eamon Ryan (Dublin Bay South, Green Party) | Oireachtas source

I will start by welcoming the group. I am someone who had a very bad stutter as a young man and boy. I got help at the age of 16 years or so. I occasionally still do stutter. It is sometimes in the middle of a speech here in the Dáil. You know it is coming up and you still have to get through it. I very much recognise the group's role and work.

I think the people of this country have shown remarkable strength of character and lived up to the Bible story, that I often think of, of the Samaritan not passing, but providing shelter and support for those who are in real, most dramatic need. The people of our country have done that, in Kerry, Donegal, Clare and right the way around the country. The Minister for Children, Equality, Disability, Integration and Youth, Deputy O'Gorman, and his team have done the most incredibly difficult job. There is something like 58,000 people from Ukraine and 12,500 from international protection. That is way beyond - it is like a full Aviva Stadium has arrived. We have had to house people. That is at a really critical point. No one should underestimate the scale of the challenge and the difficult decisions we will have to make now to continue that approach, which is the right approach I think we all agree. But it is going to be challenging.

No one is throwing away or disregarding the rights of property owners. We could have a wider discussion about our Constitution and whether we have the correct balance with the right to housing, property and so on but we are not going to go towards a system where the rights of property are completely removed or taken away. There is real need for us to look at the private rental sector. We all know it is not working and it does need to change. It is not an attack on landlords or taking away their rights. We may need incentives or other measures but we need to be very flexible and quick particularly in the next six months with property because if the numbers keep coming, 1,500 every week, we will have to show further flexibility and innovation, working with landlords and the whole variety of different accommodation providers that we might need to use. I do not disagree that we have to work with the landlords and make sure that it works for them in Killarney, Kerry and every part of the country but we do need to provide further accommodation and we will have to be very innovative in how we do that.

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