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

I am troubled by the Minister's reply. Of course we all agree that the key issue here is achieving increased supply and delivery of homes. I could not agree more with the Minister but the problem is her Government has not done enough to address this. Even the Government's own targets in Housing for All are clearly and patently too low. We have been promised the publication of increased targets by Government for many months now. The Taoiseach said again just yesterday that the revised upwards target would eventually be published in autumn of this year, but that is far too late. We are not seeing either an increase in ambition or the necessary increase in urgency to ensure there is the delivery of homes there.

When I ask the Minister a specific question about a specific scheme, she tells me about 97 properties. That is a drop in the ocean compared with the thousands of people in emergency homelessness, including over 4,000 children, as the Minister has acknowledged. The schemes that are there are just not working. I will repeat my question and ask what the Government is going to do for those who are trying to make the Government-backed schemes work in order to keep them, their children and their families in their homes. How will the Government commit to tweaking the cost rental tenant in situ scheme to make it work? It is just not working, and I have given the Minister one very specific example of a couple for whom it should be working, and it patently is not. What will the Government do to address this?

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