Richard Boyd Barrett Condemns Child Harm in Emergency Accommodation

Mr. Minister, there are many really unacceptable manifestations of the housing and homelessness emergency which your policies have generated but the most upsetting is the plight of children in emergency accommodation or homeless and a number of reports from the Royal College of Physicians and from housing NGOs have really exposed the shocking extent to which children in homeless accommodation are being neglected, that their development is being seriously affected, what are you going to do about it to protect these children, Minister? Thank you, Chair. I'm taking questions 47, 50, 52, 53 and 93 together. Rebuilding Ireland is designed to significantly increase the supply of social housing by 50,000 homes in the period of 2021, to double the output of overall housing to at least 25,000 homes per year by 2020, support all tenure types, social, private, rental and tackle homelessness comprehensively. In 2018, 8,000 new social homes were delivered nationally and this year a further 10,000 new social homes will be added to the stock. Delivery will increase again to over 11,000 homes next year and 12,000 in 2021. In fact, next year we will see the delivery of some 7,500 new built social housing homes, the highest level of this century. The Housing Agency has provided my department with a report on the Summary of Social Housing Assessments for 2019. The report shows that 68,693 households were qualified and in need of social housing support in June of this year. That is a reduction of 25% over the last three years and a trend which is expected to continue in the coming years. The reduction reflects the significantly increased level of social housing activity being delivered through Rebuilding Ireland, under which over 90,000 households across the country have had their housing needs met from 2016 to the end of the third quarter of this year. In 2018 alone, just over 27,100 households were supported which was 6% ahead of the overall target for the year and we are aiming again to support over 27,000 households this year. Supporting families experiencing homelessness is a priority for the Government and for me and my department in particular. And my department continues to work closely and proactively with the local authorities and other relevant stakeholders to ensure that we provide the necessary supports to deliver homes for all of the families currently experiencing homelessness. And for so long as any individual or family experiences homelessness, I am determined to ensure that the most appropriate emergency accommodation is available. In relation to family homelessness, my department is working with the local authorities to support the introduction of family hubs, 30 of which are already in operation, providing almost 690 spaces for family accommodation. Local authorities and their service delivery partners work with families in the hubs to secure a home with an objective to do so within a six-month period. However, in some cases it can take longer due to the housing requirements or preferences of a family. The monthly reports submitted by the local authorities to my department do not currently provide detailed information on the length of time spent by families in emergency accommodation. However, the latest information drawn from a separate local authority performance reporting mechanism shows that 38% of adults in emergency accommodation at the end of September of this year had been there for less than six months. Additional data provided by the DRHE again at the end of September of this year shows that... There is a number of questions, groups. No, but the current time is up and we are almost out of time so... I understood, Chair, when we group questions that my reply could be... I want to let Deputy Boyd Barrett in to ask supplementary and you will now finish off that. Is that all right? Thank you, Chair. Deputy Boyd Barrett, one minute. Minister, people are fed up of hearing you reel off statistics and claim achievements when it is blatantly obvious to everybody that the housing and homelessness emergency is worse than it has ever been. I mean, in terms of, you know, social housing delivery output, let me repeat. In my area, next year, two council houses will be built. Two. If you include AHBs, 13. That is how much new delivery we are getting, which is down on the previous year. But what I asked you about wasn't statistics, it was about the plight of children. Higher risk of preterm pregnancy and low birth weight. Higher rates of asthma, respiratory illness and infectious diseases. Poor nutrition and obesity. Less access to developmental opportunities, play and recreation and social activities. Poor emotional and mental health and increased behavioural difficulties. Less access to preventative healthcare and lower rates of childhood immunisation. Poor educational opportunities. Difficulties in relationships between parents and their kids. Children born into homelessness. Unable to swallow. Unable to learn how to crawl. Right? Do you think that's acceptable, Minister? Deputy, please. And what are you going to do about it to get children out of that abusive situation? Deputy, please. Thank you, Chair. Thank you, Deputy. Deputy, you're well able to use statistics when they suit you. Facts do matter. Behind each of the numbers that I mention is a family or a child or an individual who has been helped because of our plans. Like the fact that there are now less than 100 people sleeping rough on our streets. Which is too many. But it's a very important reduction since 2015 and it hasn't been that low. We've gotten people off the streets and we've gotten them into homes. For every two families that have presented to homeless services this year, we've prevented one family immediately from going into emergency accommodation. That's important. It's important that people know that we are focusing on prevention. Preventing people from going into emergency accommodation. If you are in a family hub, on average you'll spend six months in emergency accommodation. And the majority of people in emergency accommodation throughout the system are there for less than a year. This is important as well because it wasn't always that way. If it wasn't for the programs that we were bringing in, people would be suffering far longer in emergency accommodation. One of the very first cases I dealt with as Minister, literally I was in the job a week, was in relation to children not having enough crawl space, not developing their motor neuron skills because they were in the wrong type of emergency accommodation. That's why we've expanded the whole program. That's why we're expanding social housing delivery. 10,000 social housing homes this year. Family is getting keys to move into those homes. That's how we solve this crisis. Final comment, Deputy Mayor. Look, this report is from the Royal College of Physicians. Okay? And I think they know a thing or two about the development of children. And what they're saying is the children who spend time in homelessness accommodation, and it's interesting, I put in parliamentary questions I'm expecting an answer tomorrow, but you just indicate we won't get that answer. How many children, we know there's 4,000 currently in homeless accommodation, how many have spent time in emergency hubs since this government came into office? I'd like to know that because it's multiples of 4,000. And what the Royal College of Physicians are saying is these children, their life opportunities and their developmental opportunities and trajectory will be forever affected by this experience of being in emergency accommodation. And that situation has got worse, not better, in recent months, and steadily during the course of this government's term of office. I have to dispute the comments that the Deputy has made. Supply is the answer and supply is increasing. But even if you look at the numbers going to emergency accommodation, since when I came into office and the numbers today, yes, an increase in the region of 2,500, which is unacceptable. But in that same period, Deputy, 12,000 people left homelessness. That wouldn't have been possible if we weren't putting a huge amount of work into what we are doing. My point being that if we weren't putting in place all of these supports, like the 27,000 households that we'll support this year that have keys for homes, and the numbers in emergency accommodation would be far higher. We need to get them lower. Supply is the answer to getting them lower, and we continue to drive that supply each year. And it will only increase next year as it did this year on the previous year. Thank you.