Results 6,941-6,960 of 15,555 for speaker:Eoghan Murphy

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Housing, Planning and Local Government: Review of Estimates for Public Services 2017: Vote 34 - Housing, Planning and Local Government (15 Nov 2017)

Eoghan Murphy: There are exceptional HAP cases that have been brought to my attention. We have been able to help in those situations because we are obliged to meet the needs of people in difficult circumstances. There should never be an occasion where a person would have to sleep in his or her car on any night of the week because we have the resources in place to deal with such situations.

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Housing, Planning and Local Government: Review of Estimates for Public Services 2017: Vote 34 - Housing, Planning and Local Government (15 Nov 2017)

Eoghan Murphy: I thank Deputy Barry. On the statistics outlined in The Irish Timesthis morning, I have not seen either the data or the analysis. However, they do not stand up to our data in terms of what we know is happening and what we published in the second quarter of the year regarding the social housing programme. If we are looking at the social housing programme in the context of what is happening,...

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Housing, Planning and Local Government: Review of Estimates for Public Services 2017: Vote 34 - Housing, Planning and Local Government (15 Nov 2017)

Eoghan Murphy: I would really love to know how Deputy Barry thinks I am trying to minimise this.

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Housing, Planning and Local Government: Review of Estimates for Public Services 2017: Vote 34 - Housing, Planning and Local Government (15 Nov 2017)

Eoghan Murphy: I would love to hear Deputy Barry with regard to this accusation as to how he thinks I am attempting to minimise homelessness.

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Housing, Planning and Local Government: Review of Estimates for Public Services 2017: Vote 34 - Housing, Planning and Local Government (15 Nov 2017)

Eoghan Murphy: Deputy Barry's comments are disgraceful. Deputy Barry Cowen has said that we should not be politicising this issue and that we need to work together, as we are doing, to try to implement the right solutions that are going to help people. If Deputy Barry believes that he is going to create some new campaign out of this for himself to try to gain political support for his causes, which are...

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Housing, Planning and Local Government: Review of Estimates for Public Services 2017: Vote 34 - Housing, Planning and Local Government (15 Nov 2017)

Eoghan Murphy: I will come back to the initial comments. I have no wish to labour the issue, but Deputy Ó Broin is absolutely right in that I have talked about international comparisons before in discussing homelessness. My responsibility as Minister for Housing, Planning and Local Government is to ensure that we have an objective analysis of policy and that our policy is based on fact. For far too...

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Housing, Planning and Local Government: Review of Estimates for Public Services 2017: Vote 34 - Housing, Planning and Local Government (15 Nov 2017)

Eoghan Murphy: I thank the Deputy. As a brief reply to Deputy Ó Broin, we can absolutely learn lessons from other countries. That is why I think international comparisons are important. Let us leave that part of the debate there. In response to Deputy Cowen, the local infrastructure housing activiation fund, LIHAF, is an excellent initiative whereby we can use a relatively small amount of...

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Housing, Planning and Local Government: Review of Estimates for Public Services 2017: Vote 34 - Housing, Planning and Local Government (15 Nov 2017)

Eoghan Murphy: That is not necessarily true, because the spend to date would not just be for those that have been completed. It would also cover some units that are already on site, depending on how the drawdown has happened.

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Housing, Planning and Local Government: Review of Estimates for Public Services 2017: Vote 34 - Housing, Planning and Local Government (15 Nov 2017)

Eoghan Murphy: However, it depends on where the house has been built, under which scheme the money has been drawn down and whether-----

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Housing, Planning and Local Government: Review of Estimates for Public Services 2017: Vote 34 - Housing, Planning and Local Government (15 Nov 2017)

Eoghan Murphy: I can tell the Deputy that we have over 1,000 units built. Our target is to have 2,000 built by local authorities and housing bodies. All of this will be published at the end of the year, and I will then be able to say how we have spent our money for this year, exactly what that delivered on the ground and how it delivered. We can average that out across the 2,000 houses if the Deputy...

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Housing, Planning and Local Government: Review of Estimates for Public Services 2017: Vote 34 - Housing, Planning and Local Government (15 Nov 2017)

Eoghan Murphy: I will come back to the committee with a breakdown on that. I do not think it is a simple question, and I am not sure how relevant the answer will be if the Deputy is looking for the costs of delivery per unit-----

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Housing, Planning and Local Government: Review of Estimates for Public Services 2017: Vote 34 - Housing, Planning and Local Government (15 Nov 2017)

Eoghan Murphy: That is exactly what we are doing in the Department. We will have the Q3 stats in the next couple of weeks. That will give us even more information, and we can do that piece of work. However, the way the Ó Cualann houses are being delivered is obviously very different from how we are delivering houses in other schemes.

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Housing, Planning and Local Government: Review of Estimates for Public Services 2017: Vote 34 - Housing, Planning and Local Government (15 Nov 2017)

Eoghan Murphy: Getting an average per unit is not going to tell us that, but we will come back to the Deputy with that information.

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Housing, Planning and Local Government: Review of Estimates for Public Services 2017: Vote 34 - Housing, Planning and Local Government (15 Nov 2017)

Eoghan Murphy: The Senator is absolutely right about the money allocated for adaptation grants. I would like to thank the Minister of State, Deputy Finian McGrath.

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Housing, Planning and Local Government: Review of Estimates for Public Services 2017: Vote 34 - Housing, Planning and Local Government (15 Nov 2017)

Eoghan Murphy: It is a constant point of communication between us to ensure we are doing everything we can to help people in their homes and communities. The Senator asked about taxpayers' money going towards rent in the private sector. If the private sector did not exist, this problem would be much worse. There is something of a Hobson's choice in having to do that. Being able to give flexibility to...

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Housing, Planning and Local Government: Review of Estimates for Public Services 2017: Vote 34 - Housing, Planning and Local Government (15 Nov 2017)

Eoghan Murphy: On Deputy Fergus O'Dowd's points-----

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Housing, Planning and Local Government: Review of Estimates for Public Services 2017: Vote 34 - Housing, Planning and Local Government (15 Nov 2017)

Eoghan Murphy: -----we use Louth County Council as an exemplar when we look at what we are trying to do in housing provision in other parts of the country. It had an important role to play at the housing summit in September, at which it discussed the things it had done successfully such as the issuing of compulsory purchase orders. Vacanthomes.ieis a website which is managed by Mayo County Council and it...

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Housing, Planning and Local Government: Review of Estimates for Public Services 2017: Vote 34 - Housing, Planning and Local Government (15 Nov 2017)

Eoghan Murphy: That is what we are doing. We will receive the figures and see what the council believes its targets are.

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Housing, Planning and Local Government: Review of Estimates for Public Services 2017: Vote 34 - Housing, Planning and Local Government (15 Nov 2017)

Eoghan Murphy: Yes. Transparency is important.

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Housing, Planning and Local Government: Review of Estimates for Public Services 2017: Vote 34 - Housing, Planning and Local Government (15 Nov 2017)

Eoghan Murphy: There is no point in keeping the figures within the Department. It is for the local authority to do the work and its councillors to see-----