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

The figure of 11,500 people who are currently homeless is going to continue to swell unless the Government takes urgent emergency measures to stop the flow into homelessness. The major reason the vast majority of those people are homeless is because they have been evicted; the vast majority of whom have done absolutely nothing wrong. Next Friday week, I will be going into court with a family, that is, people who have worked, paid their taxes all their lives and have not done a single thing wrong. Even during a supposed ban on evictions, they are facing an enforcement order to throw them out of their home where they have lived all their lives. As they are over the threshold for social housing support they are not even entitled to housing assistance payment, HAP. What will the Government do to stop the flow of families and individuals into homelessness? I propose it has to impose a complete eviction ban and buy up the homes, regardless of where they are in terms of income, of those people who are threatened with homelessness.

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