Maurice Cummins (Fine Gael)

I support this motion and I commend the efforts of the voluntary organisations instrumental in supporting the MakeRoom campaign. It is most regrettable that the Government's amendment deleted the names of the voluntary organisations.

I am particularly interested in highlighting the plight of those within the justice system, many of whom enter and leave prison homeless. According to Bishop Donal McKeown, speaking at the opening of the new legal year, half of the State's prisoners have a history of homelessness and two-thirds of these have spent time in a psychiatric hospital. The Simon Community estimates that the provision of high-quality accommodation in the private rented sector, with a support worker, would cost €12,000 in a year. The average cost of hospital psychiatric care is €120,000 a year. To provide the same person with supported housing in a community environment would cost €40,000.

Fine Gael proposes to deal with the threat of prisoners becoming homeless when they leave prison by giving prisoners with drug addiction problems the option of full addiction treatment and rehabilitation. Currently, only those who are on the methadone maintenance programme prior to entering prison can avail of this treatment. I believe that treatment must be provided for those who have a drug problem and for those who begin to abuse drugs while in prison. Once they have left prison, we will provide increased work and educational facilities for all prisoners. Prisoners who are drug free or on methadone maintenance must receive greater assistance to allow them to remain drug free once they leave prison through the use of a compulsory specialised pre-release programme.

A strong link between housing and employment can be seen in the difficulty of holding down employment while homeless and sustaining accommodation while unemployed. This creates a vicious circle out of which it is hard to break, particularly for newly released prisoners with previous addiction problems. Little progress has been made on the proposal that the Prison Service build and provide transitional housing units as part of its strategy to prepare offenders for release, or on the proposal that education services for homeless adults be extended across the country. It is essential that we provide a greater follow-up system and co-ordination between prison officials and probation services to monitor the progress of prisoners, once they leave the prison system. It is envisaged that this would involve co-operation between prison staff, juvenile liaison officers and probation officers.

Consideration must be given to support those who move on from being homeless. Former homeless people, who tend to have few ties to family or community need continuing support after finding accommodation. Many need continuing help to allow them to live outside an institutional setting. According to the MakeRoom campaign, once a person is no longer considered homeless by the authorities, such support may be difficult to access. The main reason given for this situation is that the funding mechanism is not in place for this eventuality. Action in the new national homeless strategy on the barriers to participation in society of people who are homeless must include voting rights, participation in public policy formation, employment rights, access to financial services and so on.

To extend the area even further, it is estimated that 60% of homeless people in London are Irish-born and help must also be given to these people. Here in Ireland, I need not draw the attention of the Minister of State to the fact that he only has to leave Leinster House to see people sleeping wherever they can, in doorways, laneways and any other safe — I use the word advisedly — places they can find. Last night at 11 p.m., I walked 50 yards in each direction from the front gate of Leinster House and I counted six people bedded down for the night in doorways. Governments and society are judged on how they treat the less well-off. Based on what we see in the streets of Dublin and other locations throughout the country, I would suggest that we are failing miserably to address this problem.