Joanna Tuffy (Labour)

I also wish to raise with the Leader the figures on homelessness, house price statistics and the Simon Community report published yesterday. I would like a discussion on the reason the figures regarding homelessness – some counties have a zero rating – were disputed by the Simon Community in terms of its experience and the use of its services in the counties concerned. I support Senator O'Toole's view on the referral of the issue to the all-party committee on the Constitution, of which I am a member. While I have no problem with it discussing the issue, it is basically an excuse for the Government to do nothing about housing, about which it is within its power to do something in terms of the use of land in State ownership, adequately funding local authority housing programmes instead of introducing cutbacks and setting up an overall housing agency to co-ordinate local authority work.