Mary Lou McDonald (Dublin Central, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

Our Bill buys the Government time to do what it needs to do. I said in my initially commentary the demonstrable unanswerable evidence of the Government's absolute failure to provide housing and failure to protect renters is everywhere to be seen and felt.

At no time did I say that 4,000 people would find themselves in emergency accommodation, much less 4,000 households, for the simple reason that there is not enough emergency accommodation to facilitate them.

I went to some length to spell out to the Taoiseach what homelessness looked like: people sofa surfing; being crammed into overcrowded accommodation; being back in their parents' house, if they are lucky; many back with their grandparents; families being separated; misery; despair; and anger. This is the story, but the Taoiseach is not hearing it. Despite all of his bluster, he has comprehensively failed to answer the one question that matters to people who will be looking this reality in the eye in a matter of days - where do they go?

The Taoiseach said tritely that tenancies were abundant, but that is not the case.

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