Violet-Anne Wynne (Clare, Independent) | Oireachtas source

The last eviction ban did not work because it was not long enough. It was a time-buying exercise by the Government and was subsequently wasted because no new measures were taken with respect to scaling up either social housing or emergency accommodation in real time.

Last month, Clare County Council saw 52 new and 428 repeat presentations to their homeless action team. That is an increase of 20 new and 213 repeat presentations since November of last year. Not having an eviction ban in place this year has resulted in the number of repeat presentations to the Clare homeless action team more than doubling. At the time of the ban last year and almost every week since, I have called for five specific actions from this Government, and the Minister of State will be very familiar with them. Today, however, I will highlight that in addition to supporting this Bill, I support a full-scale ban on no-fault evictions.

As the Minister of State knows, nine out of ten evictions in Ireland are landlord-led and seven out of ten are no-fault evictions. Clare County Council has advised that it is currently working with 80 households with a notice to quit. If this ban keeps a roof over one of those families' heads, this Bill is worth supporting by one and all.

It is disappointing that the Minister has said that he will not be supporting this Bill. This Bill is the least-worst option. It is two days before the House rises for Christmas. My preference will always be for no-fault evictions to be outlawed in our State. As I said, I support this Bill. However, I note that another short-term eviction ban will result in history repeating itself, a deluge of notices to quit in the summer, and nowhere for people to go. I support the Bill, as I said, but I wish it went a little further.

I also want to briefly mention that I note the Minister of State's comments on funding for emergency accommodation. However, in the last 12 months, I have been hearing that much more than money is at issue in relation to scaling up. It is the case that the Minister has not availed of the emergency powers or exemptions required in order to effectively respond to reality. I raised this matter previously and requested that those measures be utilised by the Minister.

See this speech in context