Aideen Hayden (Labour) | Oireachtas source

I thank Senator David Norris for his comments. It is wonderful to see Dublin being defended in the way that sometimes areas west of the Shannon are defended. The north side of Dublin contains some of the poorest areas in the country.

I wish to respond to the points made about people not turning up for hospital appointments. I will give a brief account of a personal story. In 2006, at the height of the Celtic tiger, my daughter was unfortunate enough to break both of her wrists and for a number of months was in casts. Eventually she received an appointment to go to Crumlin hospital to have them removed. We duly attended. There were 300 patients before us. Eventually she was seen and the casts were removed. When I arrived home that day there was a letter from Crumlin hospital advising me not to turn up for my appointment as it had been postponed for a week. I received another letter to say the appointment was postponed for yet another week. I waited because I was curious to see how many letters I would receive before the administration of that hospital realised that my daughter's casts had already been removed. It is a bit glib to blame ordinary people for sometimes very serious deficits in administration in our hospital systems.

I congratulate the Minister of State at the Department of the Environment, Community and Local Government, Deputy Jan O'Sullivan, on getting approval from Cabinet for a strategy on homelessness. Some 84% of those at the Constitutional Convention last weekend voted for the inclusion in the Constitution of a right to a home. I am sure we are all in the same position. I have people calling to me day after day because their rent supplement is not sufficient for them to afford somewhere to live and they are moving into homeless services. I ask the Leader for a debate - perhaps two, the first on how to implement the right to a home in current circumstances and, second, to ask the Minister for Social Protection, Deputy Joan Burton, to address us on the emergency situation in rent supplement and how she plans to address it.