Results 13,421-13,440 of 15,555 for speaker:Eoghan Murphy

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Housing, Planning and Local Government: Update on Rebuilding Ireland - Action Plan for Housing and Homelessness: Discussion (29 May 2019)

Eoghan Murphy: I thank the Deputy for the questions. As I said earlier, we have seen an increase in the past month of 73 in emergency accommodation and we have seen a decrease of four families and also a decrease of 27 children. These are small decreases but decreases nonetheless. The numbers go up and down each month in different categories and in different parts of the country. That is why I have said...

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Housing, Planning and Local Government: Update on Rebuilding Ireland - Action Plan for Housing and Homelessness: Discussion (29 May 2019)

Eoghan Murphy: Personalising this to me is not going to help one family struggling in housing insecurity today or one young couple who are trying to buy a home to pay their rent or pay their bills. The Deputy might be better off trying to bring forward solutions that will get the support of other colleagues in this House. If he can, they will be supported by the Government because we are a minority. The...

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Housing, Planning and Local Government: Update on Rebuilding Ireland - Action Plan for Housing and Homelessness: Discussion (29 May 2019)

Eoghan Murphy: In response, I will again give the answer I have just given.

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Housing, Planning and Local Government: Update on Rebuilding Ireland - Action Plan for Housing and Homelessness: Discussion (29 May 2019)

Eoghan Murphy: I assume from that question that the Deputy believes he should be in power. I would love to see his ambitious programme of 100 to 200 different actions under a cohesive, progressive piece of work that will do more than what we are doing now. Where is his coalition of people? Where is his coalition of ideas? What he was saying in asking that question was that he believes he will do a...

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Housing, Planning and Local Government: Update on Rebuilding Ireland - Action Plan for Housing and Homelessness: Discussion (29 May 2019)

Eoghan Murphy: There are more than 10,378 people who are homeless. That number is the number in emergency accommodation. It does not count the people who are sleeping rough because that is a whole separate challenge.

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Housing, Planning and Local Government: Update on Rebuilding Ireland - Action Plan for Housing and Homelessness: Discussion (29 May 2019)

Eoghan Murphy: These are people who are not in any type of emergency accommodation and that number has fallen, which is welcome. There are a number of people who are facing a very challenging situation and there are, of course, people who are in housing insecurity and who do not know where is the next place they are going to live should they get served a notice to quit. There are also people who have...

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Housing, Planning and Local Government: Update on Rebuilding Ireland - Action Plan for Housing and Homelessness: Discussion (29 May 2019)

Eoghan Murphy: I thank Deputy Ó Broin. I am just taking a final note of his questions. I thank him for relaying that information to me from the school students. I could not find a Twitter handle to tweet them. Perhaps they are not on Twitter. I have invited students into the Department from time to time to present on various projects they have done. I am happy to have these students come in and...

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Housing, Planning and Local Government: Update on Rebuilding Ireland - Action Plan for Housing and Homelessness: Discussion (29 May 2019)

Eoghan Murphy: That was the last question to answer in that round.

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Housing, Planning and Local Government: Update on Rebuilding Ireland - Action Plan for Housing and Homelessness: Discussion (29 May 2019)

Eoghan Murphy: I thank the Senator. With regard to homelessness and the difficulties facing individuals, there are a number of different layers. I said that I had an engagement with the Minister for Employment Affairs and Social Protection, Deputy Regina Doherty, and we have raised it with the inter-agency group that I had set up in 2017. It has also been raised at a special meeting we have with the...

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Housing, Planning and Local Government: Update on Rebuilding Ireland - Action Plan for Housing and Homelessness: Discussion (29 May 2019)

Eoghan Murphy: The Deputy refers to 2021 as the date for what?

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Housing, Planning and Local Government: Update on Rebuilding Ireland - Action Plan for Housing and Homelessness: Discussion (29 May 2019)

Eoghan Murphy: At the end of 2021 and no more gas boilers?

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Housing, Planning and Local Government: Update on Rebuilding Ireland - Action Plan for Housing and Homelessness: Discussion (29 May 2019)

Eoghan Murphy: I never said Deputy Ó Broin should not criticise me. He should not try to claim he is not trying to personalise this issue to me when he spends more of his time producing massive posters and billboards with my face on them and driving them around town-----

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Housing, Planning and Local Government: Update on Rebuilding Ireland - Action Plan for Housing and Homelessness: Discussion (29 May 2019)

Eoghan Murphy: No. That is not what the Deputy is doing.

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Housing, Planning and Local Government: Update on Rebuilding Ireland - Action Plan for Housing and Homelessness: Discussion (29 May 2019)

Eoghan Murphy: It is not.

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Housing, Planning and Local Government: Update on Rebuilding Ireland - Action Plan for Housing and Homelessness: Discussion (29 May 2019)

Eoghan Murphy: The Deputy is trying to personalise the crisis we have in homelessness to me rather than focusing on some of the important improvements happening or some of the changes that should be pursued. Even when I talk about why the changes Deputy Ó Broin suggests cannot be pursued, why they would not work and why they would have a displacement effect and could actually make things worse, he...

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Housing, Planning and Local Government: Update on Rebuilding Ireland - Action Plan for Housing and Homelessness: Discussion (29 May 2019)

Eoghan Murphy: This is the problem when the Deputy comes up against facts. They are quickly forgotten and he goes to mantras we have heard before. I had this in the Seanad last week during debate on the rent Bill. I had to make the same arguments again, even though I had already made them in the previous week with the same representatives from Deputy Ó Broin's party because they were not listening...

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Housing, Planning and Local Government: Update on Rebuilding Ireland - Action Plan for Housing and Homelessness: Discussion (29 May 2019)

Eoghan Murphy: I thank the Senator for his questions. To respond to the last question he asked, I did not see the report, I am afraid, because we were in committee first thing this morning. The plan is, as we finish our voids programme, which is coming to its conclusion, to move that money and activity into maintenance. Maintenance of the social housing stock across the country fell through the crisis...

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Housing, Planning and Local Government: Update on Rebuilding Ireland - Action Plan for Housing and Homelessness: Discussion (29 May 2019)

Eoghan Murphy: I will be more specific. The Housing Agency has finished its work on the land aggregation scheme, which I believe it has published. According to the report I have, all of the plans were returned by the end of September 2017. Separately, local authorities are updating the Rebuilding Ireland land map. I will get a detailed note for the Senator to confirm the position and see what we can do...

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Housing, Planning and Local Government: Update on Rebuilding Ireland - Action Plan for Housing and Homelessness: Discussion (29 May 2019)

Eoghan Murphy: I want to be sure that the local authorities did misinterpret something from our side. I do not want to say they are not in compliance with this action in case they had a different understanding of the position.

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Housing, Planning and Local Government: Update on Rebuilding Ireland - Action Plan for Housing and Homelessness: Discussion (29 May 2019)

Eoghan Murphy: I thank the Deputy for the question. He talks about the failure of policy but I am not sure what policy proposal he is bringing forward as a silver bullet to the challenges we face. What we require in housing is a number of different policies because it is a very complex area. That is what we have. To pretend Deputy Boyd Barrett has some radical and different way of doing it that would...