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

Under a Fianna Fáil housing Minister - one from the Minister's own party - homelessness has reached record levels in the lifetime of this Government. We warned last year that the failure to extend the ban on evictions would lead to a massive increase in the number of people without a home. Sadly, that has come to pass. The September homelessness figures were published a fortnight ago, as the Dáil went into recess. Those figures showed that 12,827 people are now without a home in Ireland. Let us contrast that with the figures when the Government came to power in July 2020, when there were 8,728 people registered as homeless. In the space of just over three years, the Government has, shockingly, managed to increase homelessness by more than 4,000 women, men and children. That is a surge of almost 50%. Has the Government become desensitised to the gravity of these enormous figures? Behind every figure, there is an individual person – a woman, man or child – who has been left without a home. This is the desperate reality.

Will the Minister admit that the Government's housing policy has failed? Ministers say endlessly that we cannot build houses overnight – of course, we cannot – but across the board, the Government's actions in the past three years have undermined its stated aims of keeping people in affordable and secure homes. The Government will not act to restrict no-fault evictions to keep people in their homes. It will not act to impose a use-it-or-lose-it obligation on developers who speculate on land. That has been delayed. Just this morning, it has become clear that the Government will also not face up to its responsibility to fund local authorities to bring vacant homes back into use and provide social homes.

In oral questions to the Minister for Housing, Local Government and Heritage this morning, I raised a concerning situation, which has been brought to my attention by my Labour Party colleague, a Dublin city councillor for the south-west inner city, Darragh Moriarty. He has given me the minutes of a meeting of Dublin City Council, which show that Government funding for repairing and refurbishing empty council homes is being reduced further. Indeed, Olivia Kelly reports today in The Irish Timesthat council officials have confirmed that "department funding has changed ... that [the budget is] constantly coming down" for refurbishment of what are known as voids or empty local authority homes. An official has estimated that as many 220 fewer homes will be turned around as a result of a central government cut in next year's local authority budget for Dublin. The Minister should make no mistake: that is 220 fewer families in the Dublin City Council area who will be housed in a refurbished home as a result of central government cuts. If there are 220 fewer homes every year for the next three years, it will mean 660 additional families will be left to languish on the housing list. Yet, we get replies from the Minister for Housing, Local Government and Heritage and his colleagues that skirt around commenting on the figures. This morning, the Minister of State, Deputy Noonan, said that funding would be available to councils. Is the Government saying that Dublin City Council is wrong? We would welcome clarification. Is this a national issue? Has the Government actually cut funding to councils to bring empty homes back into use? Can the Minister guarantee that councils in Dublin and across the country will have enough money to deliver homes for people who desperately need them in 2024?

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