Jennifer Murnane O'Connor (Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I gladly second the motion, as it is critical. The Minister of State is aware we have a very urgent housing crisis. I welcome that all local authorities recently received a new assessment of the social housing needs that will qualify people and let them know exactly what housing support exists. I want to know the figures for people on housing support and those who depend on rent supplement.Can the Minister provide those figures separately? Also, can we have separate figures for Dublin and for the rural counties? I would appreciate figures for both.

Second, the Minister will be aware that we have accommodation that is unfit, overcrowded, unsuitable or unsuitable due to exceptional medical needs or on compassionate grounds. These are people in real need. Their low priority is an indication that the Department has never highlighted them as a particular group. When one goes to the local authority, one's name is put on a housing list. Regardless of whether it is unfit or unsuitable accommodation, one's name goes on the housing list, but one is not in a particular group. I ask the Minister to address this because it is an urgent issue. These people in need must be made a priority.

The Department has long been informed of several sources for capitalising house purchases, whereby the rental money could be used to purchase houses instead of renting. I have a major issue with this. I believe the current crisis is due to the fact that we are renting or leasing and it is costing the Government and the country a fortune. There are cases where the Department is promoting the leasing of units and has prohibited councils from purchasing priority housing for a small amount of money. Councils are seeking to buy houses, but the Minister is not providing the money. He is saying, in effect, that we will continue renting but will not buy the houses. That is unfair. I have some statistics from last year. In 2015, some €67 million was spent on renting, leasing and on hotel and bed and breakfast accommodation. We must look forward and progress. We must buy and, as my colleague said, we must build housing.

I have a query for the Minister about capital construction. This is construction of local authority houses. There is a four stage plan for every local authority when it is building houses. I ask the Minister to reduce this four stage plan to a single stage plan. As he knows, when a local authority brings the first stage to the Department, it might not be returned for six months. After sending the second stage, it could be another six months to get it back. The timescale with this is not good enough. We have a housing crisis so the Minister should change the four stage plan to a single stage plan.

There has been a housing crisis for the past two years, but I do not understand why the Minister and the Department, through the national spatial strategy, have reduced the amount of land zoned for housing. Under the spatial strategy, local authorities have had to do what we could call de-zoning - we have de-zoned lands. However, there is a need to build houses. There is a report in the newspaper today of a recommendation to the housing Department to consider building 50,000 local authority houses. I ask the Minister to change the national spatial strategy to enable us to build houses and give planning permission to build them, because we must.

There is major potential for the credit union sector to issue home loans to assist in meeting the major social need for housing. I ask the Minister to examine this aspect. In addition, I read a newspaper report today, although I understand this information emerged yesterday, that the Government is considering introducing legislation to put a moratorium on repossessions. I beg the Government to do this. This is probably one of the most urgent requirements of the Government - that it keep people and children in their homes. We have a crisis and unless these simple things are addressed it will not be solved. Renting is the reason we have a housing crisis today.

I have a question for the Minister relating to my local authority in Carlow. Carlow is always forgotten. A maximum rate is set to get on the local authority housing list and in Carlow it is €25,000. If one is earning €25,000 one does not qualify to be put on the local authority housing list, yet in the neighbouring counties of Kilkenny, Laois and Wicklow the maximum is €30,000. Why is Carlow forgotten again? Why is that Carlow people cannot be put at the top of the scale at €30,000 like everybody else? I urge the Minister to answer all of these questions, because they are serious issues.

In this day and age, it is criminal if every county in Ireland does not have a women's refuge for women and their children. Carlow does not have a women's refuge, nor does it have emergency housing. There is talk of €200 million being allocated to emergency housing, so I ask the Minister to ensure that every county in Ireland has a women's refuge. At present, there are buildings which are being sold for reasonable prices and I am aware that the Minister must work with the HSE and Tusla in this regard. It is about everybody working together, but this must be done. As I said, we are in a crisis.

I welcome the new tenant purchase scheme. It had not been given to local authorities for over two years. Who writes these schemes for local authorities? Again, the most vulnerable in our community are not allowed to purchase their house. The new tenant purchase scheme provides that there must be a 50% income coming into the household. Old age pensioners who have just retired do not qualify and are not allowed to buy their house, even though they might have come into a certain amount of money or they might have been made redundant. People who inherit money or who perhaps win money are not allowed to purchase their house. Once again, the new tenant purchase scheme only suits very few. Who drafts these schemes? It just does not make sense.

My colleague referred to child poverty and homelessness. Over the past year in Carlow, we set up a soup kitchen; we called it St. Clare's Hospitality. With the summer approaching there will be more children and families attending, as the children are not in school. We are trying to keep these families fed. We also give food parcels to families that are most in need. I am ashamed to say that when St. Clare's Hospitality set up the soup kitchen over a year ago, we could not get any streamlined funding from any Department to fund it. We have a homelessness crisis and a housing crisis and we are setting up soup kitchens because people are hungry, but there is no funding from the Government. With the €200 million in funding and with all the Departments working together, the Minister must look after the poor and most vulnerable in our community. I seek answers to my questions but I also seek results. I want funding to go to these areas.