Darragh O'Brien (Dublin Fingal, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

As the Deputy will be aware, supporting individuals and families facing homelessness is a key priority for me and the Government. Critical to supporting households to exit homelessness is increasing supply. Thankfully, we are seeing supply increase substantially. At the end of quarter 1, we will have our social housing and affordable numbers for 2023 which I predict will show an increase on the previous year.

Record State investment of more than €5 billion has been made available this year to support the largest State home building programme ever, including 9,300 new build homes - that is just the new-build piece. The Government has also approved the continuation of the tenant in situ scheme, which is an important preventative measure. It has been very successful. Last year, we set out a minimum target of 1,500. I do not have the final figure on that but I can tell the House it is between 1,700 and 1,800 of concluded sales - fully closed. There are others going through the process.

I have approved, through local authorities, an additional 1,500 acquisitions where a landlord issued a notice of termination. The scheme is working and I want to ensure that continues. Initial issues with it in some local authorities have certainly been ironed out.

In relation to homelessness itself, we have a budget this year of €242 million for the delivery of homeless services. The funding will support households experiencing homelessness with emergency accommodation and wrap-around support. Anyone who finds himself or herself in homelessness will be supported by the State in emergency accommodation. We want to ensure that they are staying less time there and exiting into permanent secure housing. I will come back in the supplementary with the number of exits and preventions that had last year, which are increasing. We saw a slight decrease in December overall but we have a lot more work to do in that space, particularly around ensuring that the allocations to homeless individuals and families increase into the new social housing that I expect to see this year.

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