Denise Mitchell (Dublin Bay North, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

The housing and homelessness crisis has been getting worse under successive Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael Governments, so this decision to further restrict the tenant in situ scheme, which has prevented so many people from becoming homeless, is bizarre.

On top of these new restrictions, we also have delays on applications going back months because the Government could not get its act together and agree new funding levels and targets for 2025.

I will give an example of what these delays mean. A mother in my constituency with two children who has been living in a home for ten years has been waiting since last August to find out if they are going to have to leave their home, the only home those children have known. This woman's landlord was happy to go down the tenant in situ route, but because of the delays in funding for her application with Fingal County Council, it has now been put on pause for six months, leaving this family in limbo, which is not good enough.

Now the Government is restricting who can apply. Single people and couples without children will not be able to avail of it. It also appears that these changes will mean that local authorities will not be able to refurbish homes they buy under this scheme. This reads like an attempt to do away with the scheme by making it totally unworkable. However, this scheme has been proven to work. In the last two years it has prevented 2,500 households from becoming homeless. We in Sinn Féin have made a proposal for funding of the scheme to allow for 6,500 homes to be purchased in a five-year term. We want to continue to work under the current rules and we want to make sure that local authorities have the staff to process the applications.

I ask all TDs in this House to vote for the motion and give local authorities the funding and the flexibility to operate this scheme. This scheme would prevent other families going into homelessness. Please support this motion.

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