Dáil debates

Thursday, 26 January 2023

Ceisteanna ar Sonraíodh Uain Dóibh - Priority Questions

Homeless Persons Supports

11:14 am

Photo of Richard Boyd BarrettRichard Boyd Barrett (Dún Laoghaire, People Before Profit Alliance)
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86. To ask the Minister for Housing, Planning, and Local Government if he plans to extend the moratorium on certain evictions after 31 March 2022; the other measures he will put in place to stop the flow of people into homelessness; if those measures will include an increase in the number of Part V property bought, allowing councils and approved housing bodies, AHBs, to buy homes where people have a notice to quit and would be eligible for cost rental, and accelerating the programme to bring vacant homes back into use; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [3875/23]

Photo of Richard Boyd BarrettRichard Boyd Barrett (Dún Laoghaire, People Before Profit Alliance)
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This is a priority question and the senior Minister is not here, which I find unacceptable.

On Friday week I will accompany to the court Jackie and her husband - he has worked all his life for a State company and they have two kids - for a case involving an enforcement order, following which they will most likely be evicted from their home having done nothing wrong. Because they are slightly over the income threshold, they are not entitled to HAP or social housing and are expected to live in their car in a couple of weeks' time. Added to that can be Tathony House, with 35 residents facing eviction, and Rathmines Road, with about a dozen facing eviction. All this is happening and the Government continues to allow families and working people - decent people who have done nothing wrong - to be evicted into homelessness. What will the Government do to stop this shameful scandal?

Photo of Malcolm NoonanMalcolm Noonan (Carlow-Kilkenny, Green Party)
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Gabhaim buíochas leis an Teachta as an gceist seo.

The aim of the Residential Tenancies (Deferment of Termination Dates of Certain Tenancies) Act 2022 is to afford time for housing supply to increase and to reduce the burden on homelessness services and the pressure on tenants and the residential tenancies market. To assist in managing demands on housing services after the winter emergency period and to ensure there is no cliff-edge impact on 1 April, the Act provides for deferred notices of termination to take effect on a phased basis over the period from 1 April to 18 June 2023. The Act has been carefully calibrated to limit its interference with landlords' constitutional property rights. As a further emergency measure, the Minister has written to local authority chief executives informing them of a decision to continue, for the duration of the winter emergency period and up to the end of the transition period in June 2023, with the delegated sanction of purchasing homes where the tenant is at risk of homelessness.

Ultimately, increased supply across all tenures is key to eradicating homelessness. Housing supply is increasing under Housing for All. Record State investment of €4.5 billion will be made available in 2023 to support the largest State home building programme ever, with 9,100 direct-build social homes and 5,500 affordable homes.

Due to the provisions of the scheme, cost rental does not facilitate the purchase of individual second-hand properties, with capital expenditure focused on acquisition and development of additional new units to help increase overall housing stock. In line with Government commitments, the Affordable Housing Act 2021 will increase Part V provision from 10% for social housing to a mandatory 20% for social, affordable and cost-rental housing requirements.

I will come back in with a supplementary response to the specifics of the question.

Photo of Richard Boyd BarrettRichard Boyd Barrett (Dún Laoghaire, People Before Profit Alliance)
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Blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. This is the problem when the senior Minister is not here: we just get script. No disrespect to the Minister of State, Deputy Noonan, but that is the problem. None of what he said stops the cliff edge Jackie, her husband and their two kids face in being evicted next Friday from the home in which they have lived all their lives, and this during what is supposedly a moratorium on such evictions. That is what is happening in reality. What the Minister of State said does not stop the stress the 35 residents and families with kids and so on in Tathony House face as their landlord tries to drum them all out from the places where they have lived. All of them paid their rent and never did anything wrong and they are being chucked out on the street. Then there is Rathmines Road.

The Government needs to say clearly that people who pay their rent and have done nothing wrong will not end up in homeless accommodation. That can be done by banning such evictions and by having a clear policy whereby the State will step in and buy properties where landlords are exiting the market, regardless of whether those tenants' incomes are slightly over an income threshold - an arbitrary, cliff-edge income threshold, to use the term the Minister of State has just used.

Photo of Malcolm NoonanMalcolm Noonan (Carlow-Kilkenny, Green Party)
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I am not familiar with the specifics of the cases the Deputy has raised. If he would bring them forward to us, it would be useful.

While there are no further proposals in respect of the extension of the current moratorium, the Department is keeping this under constant review and our Department has commenced work on an overall review of the private rented sector, as committed to under a review of Housing for All, which was published last November.

As for acquisitions and support to prevent homelessness, the Department is supporting local authorities to acquire homes for social houses for priority purposes, including acquisitions which support a household to exit homelessness or appropriate acquisitions with tenants in situto prevent homelessness. There is a suite of measures in that regard but, again, I am not familiar with the specific cases the Deputy raises. If he would bring them-----

Photo of Richard Boyd BarrettRichard Boyd Barrett (Dún Laoghaire, People Before Profit Alliance)
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I know the Minister of State is not, but the Minister is. Jackie and her husband, who, I repeat, works for a State company, with their two kids have written to the Minister, to the Taoiseach and to everybody. They have written to Frank Curran, the head of Dún Laoghaire-Rathdown County Council. They are over the income threshold, so none of the things the Minister of State said will help them. Jackie and her family cry themselves to sleep every night and they are going to be living in a car because they have nowhere to go, no HAP and no support. Then there are the families in Tathony House and Rathmines Road, all facing the prospect of ending up on the street because there is nowhere to go.

There needs to be a clear policy whereby people who have paid their rent and have done nothing wrong will not end up in emergency accommodation or in a car. That has to be the policy. The State must step in even if a person's income is slightly over the threshold. Cost rental is a recognition that people who are not eligible for social housing still cannot afford market prices. Therefore, the State needs to step in in those cases as well and there needs to be a clear imperative that it will do so. Why would the Government let people become homeless? It will have to pay for and deal with the consequences of that. Why would it not do everything to stop that?

Photo of Malcolm NoonanMalcolm Noonan (Carlow-Kilkenny, Green Party)
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The State is intervening at an unprecedented scale in dealing with the homelessness crisis and the issues of residential tenancies.

Specifically, our Department is reviewing the case to which the Deputy refers. I give that assurance to the Deputy. So far I cannot speak any further to it but it is under review.