Peadar Tóibín (Meath West, Sinn Fein)
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239. To ask the Minister for Environment, Community and Local Government if his proposed 20-point action plan to tackle emergency and short-term homelessness will be extended to County Meath; the number of vacant properties in the County Meath area that will be brought back into immediate use; and the number of additional emergency beds that will be provided in County Meath by Christmas. [48629/14]

Alan Kelly (Tipperary North, Labour)
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On 4 December I hosted a special Summit on Homelessness to reaffirm the Government's commitment to end involuntary long-term homelessness by the end of 2016. The Summit was attended by Oireachtas members, elected members and officials from the four Dublin Local Authorities, representatives from Government De partments, State Agencies and the NGO sector , and the Catholic and Church of Ireland Archbishops of Dublin. A number of actions arising from the Summit were considered at the meeting of the Cabinet Committee on Social Policy and Public Service Reform on 8 December and were then formalised into an Action Plan to Address Homelessness which was noted by the Government at its meeting on 9 December 2014. In addition to those actions which constitute an immediate response to the is sue of rough sleeping in Dublin, actions have been identified which tackle the more systemic issues, classified under the three categories of the ‘housing-led’a pproach.A copy of th is action plan is available on my Department’s website at .In addition, all housing authorities will return void properties to productive use as a matter of urgencyunder the action plan.

Statutory responsibility in relation to the provision of accommodation for homeless persons rests with individual housing authorities and the purposes for which housing authorities may incur expenditure in addressing homelessness are prescribed in Section 10 of the Housing Act 1988. I am making arrangements to ensure that sufficient Section 10 funding is available nationally in respect of additional costs incurred by housing authorities in securing emergency accommodation during the Christmas period.