Cian O'Callaghan (Dublin Bay North, Social Democrats) | Oireachtas source

The Social Democrats will be supporting the Bill. I thank Deputy Ó Broin for bringing it forward.

If anything, and I mean this in a constructive fashion, we think the Bill is too weak. As the Deputies in Sinn Féin have said, this is a modest proposal. We would like to see the situation in place in most European countries, and there is nothing radical about this at all. People who pay their rent do not get evicted. That is what happens is most European countries. I do not know how many times I need to say this for the Government to hear it, but guess what? That is in European countries with larger rental sectors than we have, more investment in the rental sectors and more landlords. The argument from the Government is that landlords will flee and you cannot get investment if you have the normal protections in place for renters that exist in every other European country. That just does not hold up. The Government and the Taoiseach, Leo Varadkar, often say the temporary ban on no-fault evictions was not working. That also does not hold up. That is what the Taoiseach and the Minister for housing have told us on many occasions. However, look at the homeless numbers when the temporary ban was in place, and especially the impact on children growing up without a home. Last December, following the introduction of the temporary no-fault eviction ban, the number of children in emergency homeless accommodation dropped. That was after 11 months of consecutive increases. For three consecutive months during the eviction ban, the number of children living in emergency homeless accommodation went down, and yet the Taoiseach and others try to claim the eviction ban was not working. Is that not working? More children had a home, and fewer children over the Christmas period were in emergency accommodation. That is surely evidence of it working. Since the eviction ban was lifted we have had 11 straight months of increases. Every single month child homelessness has increased to record levels never seen before in this country. There are 4,000 children heading into Christmas in emergency homeless accommodation. That alone is surely evidence of the eviction ban working.

It has been said that no-fault evictions are the European norm, and that point has been well made. However, the Minister said this evening that the reason the moratorium came in last year was because there was a constraint in emergency accommodation, and that problem is no longer there. He said that emergency homeless accommodation is available for anyone who needs it. I do not know what reality the Minister for housing, Deputy O'Brien, is living in if he thinks that is the situation. All of us in this Chamber hear from people who have become homeless the whole time, and who have huge difficulties accessing emergency accommodation. Someone contacted me, for example, who was ringing the number to access emergency homeless accommodation and being asked if they had a car, and if they could stay in the car instead. That is the response to the people in need of emergency accommodation, from officials managing it; "What about your car?" This woman did not have a car, but was being told this by the people effectively working on behalf of the Minister, the Government and the State, when she was looking for emergency accommodation.

More and more people are finding it difficult to access emergency accommodation. Some local authorities have been using local connection rules to refuse people access to emergency accommodation. That is not something that exists on a statutory basis. They tell people they are not originally from Dublin, so they have to go somewhere else in the country. They tell them they are not originally from Limerick, so they should go back to where they came from. There are good reasons why people will often present to emergency homeless accommodation outside of the place they had their last private rented accommodation. Those reasons include people fleeing domestic violence or difficult family break-ups. They could be fleeing a drug debt or intimidation. We have also had situations where, let us say, people originally from Dublin rented in Wexford, the tenancy broke down, they became homeless and they came back to Dublin to try to access emergency accommodation. They are told that because the last place they are on record as living is Wexford they have to present to Wexford emergency accommodation. That statement from the Minister that there is ample emergency accommodation now available for anyone who needs it simply does not match the reality for people on the ground.

It is a pity that every time we have these discussions on housing, the first thing the Minister does, once he has concluded his remarks, is leave so he can hear as little as possible about the reality on the ground. If he listened to people in the Opposition about this he might learn some of the realities, which would be helpful in his role. I raise one example of a person and family who would benefit if this Bill were supported by the Government. A constituent contacted me recently who has been living in a one bedroom apartment with four children for almost ten years. The accommodation is so cramped she has to share the bed with some of her children because there is no space. Her landlord is continuously threatening to raise the rent. She has been constantly searching for alternative accommodation but cannot find anything in the price range for HAP, and she cannot even get viewings. The family will be evicted from its accommodation in February. They are extremely worried they will not be able to get any space in emergency accommodation on the northside of Dublin and will have to commute long distances for the children to attend school. Her children are worried about missing out on participating in the local sports clubs and teams and being disconnected from their friends in the area. This is how children are really affected. This is the reality for this family, and is what they are thinking about and worrying about as they approach Christmas.

The Government is effectively gaslighting people on housing and telling them their housing plan is working. If this is what a housing plan that is working looks like, I would not want to know what a housing plan looks like that does not work. Not only is the Government refusing to reinstate the no-fault eviction ban, which was proven to work, it is not proposing any new measures to tackle homelessness and child homelessness. The no-fault eviction ban would temporarily bring us into line with other European countries, and that is all it would do. Last year, four local authorities sold off more social homes than they built. These local authorities decreased their social housing stock in the middle of a homeless crisis. In the budget this year, the Minister for Finance announced measures to further incentivise and support the sale of social housing by local authorities. Next year, we face the prospect of probably more than four local authorities selling off more social homes than they build. At the same time hundreds of millions of euro allocated by this Government to build social housing has been left unspent. A significant amount of it has been returned to the Exchequer. This year alone, €220 million allocated for local authority social housing has been allocated elsewhere, while €70 million allocated for affordable housing is also being allocated elsewhere. The housing situation has never been so dire. We have record homeless levels and record rents. We have record numbers of people in their twenties and thirties stuck in their childhood bedrooms. The human cost of this and the impact on well-being, mental health and relationships and increasing stress and anxiety is huge.

I conclude by raising one issue that is deeply worrying, which is the Government's response. We keep asking what it is going to do about these record levels of homelessness and it says nothing new We then hear it is thinking about doing something but it is the wrong thing altogether. From the review the Government is doing of the homeless Act, the criteria around it and the engagement so far, it appears its answer to record levels of people in emergency homeless accommodation is to reduce the eligibility criteria for people accessing it. We see how that is playing out for people seeking international protection, but we now see it being considered for standard emergency homeless accommodation. If the Government goes ahead with this it will mean more people sleeping on the streets. If you try to put on a statutory basis the local connection rule a number of local authorities are operating, it will mean more vulnerable people sleeping on the streets and not getting shelter. It will mean more homeless deaths. There is no way that will be avoided. It will put huge strain on the services trying to support and get people off the streets into emergency homeless accommodation. If you put that local connection rule on a statutory basis, you are reducing the eligibility criteria to access homeless accommodation. Instead of doing that, the Government needs to be getting solutions to homelessness, to get more people off the streets, more people out of emergency homeless accommodation, and not trying to reduce the eligibility criteria that will push more people onto the streets and into rough sleeping.

That is absolutely the wrong approach. I call on the Minister of State to commit in his concluding remarks that the Government will not go down that route.

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