Barry Cowen (Offaly, Fianna Fail)
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128. To ask the Minister for Housing, Planning, Community and Local Government to outline the status of his Department's plan to triple Housing First tenancies; and his views on whether this can be achieved by mid 2017. [2346/17]

Simon Coveney (Cork South Central, Fine Gael)
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Under Action 1.12 of Rebuilding Ireland: Action Plan for Housing and Homelessness, the Dublin Region Homeless Executive (DRHE) is committed to tripling the target for tenancies under its ‘housing first’ programme to 300 by end-2017. The aim is to provide permanent, stable and supported housing to long-term homeless individuals and thus reduce the reliance on emergency accommodation over time.

This programme is operated under a contract which is being delivered through a joint consortium of Focus Ireland and the Peter McVerry Trust. I understand that in the region of 60 tenancies (accommodating some 70 individuals) have been created to date under the programme. The DRHE, Focus Ireland and the Peter McVerry Trust will be dedicating additional staff in 2017 to deliver on this action and I am confident that the target of 300 tenancies by the end of 2017 will be achieved.