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

-----in issues that arise in their jurisdictions. On the question of income thresholds, of course there is an issue. There has to be, and some mechanism is needed to resolve it. There is no point in saying there is not an issue because there many people with lower incomes who cannot get housing. Therefore, there has to be a targeting of resources too. We cannot just go in one direction only. Every local authority has resources. Each has to allocate those resources for different schemes. Again, there should be ways of intervening to prevent what is going on in the case the Deputy has identified. I am aware the Minister has been in touch with the Deputy and has engaged with him on this. We banned evictions more generally across the system until the end of March. The relevant legislation has been introduced.

On Deputy Murphy's question on apartment defects, I have said in the House that the Minister will come back to the House later in the year regarding a scheme and the associated report he published. He will come to the Government with it and then to the Oireachtas.

On Deputy Barry's remarks, I have met the person concerned. I do not believe we should raise individual cases here. The organisation dealing with homelessness has been outstanding down through the years. There is a huge crowd of community supporters. I do not know the background to the case, which I will pursue further, but we need to be careful in the House that we do not interrogate the actions of organisations that have for a long time been working with homeless and emergency accommodation.

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