Lynn Ruane (Independent) | Oireachtas source

I thank the Minister for coming to the House. I will begin by welcoming what I believe has been done right in housing since the emergence of the Covid-19 pandemic last year. I welcome the fact that, finally, the Department and the Minister moved to introduce an eviction ban, despite many years of claiming that such a ban would be unconstitutional. I reject the notion that such a ban must be tied to the existence of level 5 restrictions. No person should be evicted from his or her while this pandemic is ongoing, whether at level 5 or level 1. When people are so heavily reliant on the physical structure of their houses or other accommodation for protection against a highly infectious disease, no one should be forced onto the streets.

I urge the Minister to reconsider this policy and to extend the ban until the public health situation stabilises, even after it is downgraded from level 5. After the blanket ban was lifted in August, more than 360 people were served with eviction notices. The fact that notices were served immediately after the end of the moratorium demonstrates precisely why we need a long-term eviction ban while we are in this crisis and during our emergence from it. I have written previously to the Minister on issues relating to the stop-start nature of the ban, such as estate agents forcing tenants to allow viewings of small living spaces without social distancing. Strong direction needs to come from the Department to the effect that such practices are inexcusable and must end for the duration of the pandemic.

Furthermore, when the now Residential Tenancies Act 2020 was going through the House, concerns were raised about 28-day window that applies to rent arrears. Such a period in which a tenant may pay rent arrears is simply not long enough. An amendment seeking to increase this period to 60 days was tabled in the House, as it was highlighted that people may easily build up 28 days of arrears, especially in the current Covid-19 context. I urge the Minister to reconsider this measure.

In recent years, there has been a pressing concern about the use of strategic housing development, SHD, permissions. Given that it has emerged that only 30% of those developments have gone ahead since SHD was introduced in 2017, use-it-or-lose-it legislation is essential to stopping this practice, which is tantamount to land hoarding. While it is welcome that the Minister has amended planning guidelines to restrict co-living developments, does he intend to take action on co-living developments that were granted planning permission before his direction? The prospect of co-living developments being constructed while a virus that thrives on poor ventilation and close quarters is in such wide circulation is horrifying. What actions does the Minister plan for those developments currently under construction?Throughout 2020, when our homes were the first line of defence against Covid-19, investment funds spent €1.75 billion buying up residential properties throughout Ireland, according to CBRE Ireland, with properties in Dublin accounting for 97% of properties bought by these funds. In 2017, the Central Statistics Office, CSO, identified approximately 30,000 vacant properties across Dublin's four local authority areas. To prevent land hoarding, would the Minister consider the introduction of a proper vacant site tax to disincentivise such practices by multinational corporations? At this point, such a tax is a public health priority and must be considered as a matter of urgency.

The current position on homelessness in Dublin is quite dire. I understand that over half of our beds are privately run, with little oversight, and the general quality standards do not apply. I understand the Minister's Department finally conceded this fact in recent weeks. What plans has the Minister to remedy this? After so many years of crisis, how is it that so many people are still dying on our streets?

I am also concerned about the standard of financial governance in the privately-run homeless accommodation. The Department of Housing, Local Government and Heritage is not publishing its accounts on homelessness expenditure in full on its website. Where it is, the accounts do not appear to be audited and they are often confusing or misleading to read, without a clear breakdown of expenditure on private services with no oversight and on public services subject to national standards of homelessness care.

Staff in private emergency accommodation do not seem to be adequately trained to meet the complex needs and social care demands of such a role. Many homeless people do not seem to have a key worker assigned to them or care plans in place. Most concerningly, the local connection rule, of which the Minister is aware, is being used as a way for local authorities to absolve themselves of responsibility for providing homeless services. Can the Minister please commit to issuing a statutory instrument to the effect that such a policy would be prohibited? It is my understanding that the policy still applies, unfortunately. Local authorities need to be instructed, with no room for equivocation on how unacceptable these policies are.

As the Minister will be aware, our capacity to respond to how Covid-19 affects the housing and homelessness crises is constrained by the structural problems caused by those crises before Covid arrived. The high costs of construction, the shortage of public and social housing and the lack of security of tenure in the private and rental market also continue to be major contributory factors.

While I welcome that public housing construction rates seem to be increasing, I am deeply concerned by the Minister's new flagship policy, the affordable purchase share equity scheme, whereby the State would take equity with first-time buyers in a house. This has all the hallmarks of poorly thought-out Fianna Fáil housing policy and it is in the same vein as the former Government's help-to-buy scheme, which has been proven to have contributed to house price inflation. When the Minister's own civil servants are advising so heavily against such a scheme, I urge him to reconsider a move that will only reduce affordability even more. These issues do not exist in a vacuum. As long as the Government pursues policies that make housing less affordable and less accessible, our ability to respond to Covid-19 robustly is challenged even further.

I join colleagues in acknowledging the work of front-line homelessness services over the past year. During the first lockdown, I returned to working in the homeless sector, which I had done for a long time before I became a politician. During the current lockdown, I have continued to work as many shifts as possible with Safetynet Primary Care. I have seen at first hand the commitment of Safetynet and the likes of Ana Liffey, which taxi people from the homeless community back and forth into Safetynet. They ensure people get a Covid swab and go into isolation where required. The service runs so smoothly because of the dedication, fast action and decision-making of the CEO of Safetynet, Dr. Fiona O'Reilly. The staff are working on a shoestring budget to provide their service. I would love to see better resources put into Safetynet, especially during the implementation of the Covid-19 vaccination programme. The Minister's Department and the Department of Health should work together on how Safetynet could be used as part of the vaccination programme in terms of reaching into communities that are vulnerable and that might be more susceptible to misinformation on vaccines. There might be some vaccine hesitation in those communities.

In the past few weeks, when I was with staff members of Safetynet at a number of halting sites doing sweeps and taking swabs, I saw the benefit of the hepatitis A vaccination programme being rolled out by the organisation. Let me outline what was most concerning while I was on site.I have the videos on my phone and I am happy to show them to the Minister. The person who allowed me to take the videos, however, does not want me to share them publicly. They are absolutely ashamed and scared that people will see how they have been living, through no fault of their own. Faeces is coming up through their sink and showers and their toilets do not flush. Now, in Dublin in 2021, there is an outbreak of hepatitis A due to poor sanitation and substandard accommodation. This needs to be acted on as a matter or urgency. I do not know how anyone is supposed to protect themselves against Covid-19 when they cannot even protect themselves against what would usually be a disease common in a developing country due to sanitation.