Homelessness failure causing citizens to become disenchanted with politics and politicians

Fianna Fáil’s Housing Spokesperson, Darragh O’Brien TD has said that the failure of the Housing Minister, Eoghan Murphy to stem the homelessness crisis is one of the main reasons why the public are becoming disenchanted with politics and with politicians.

Deputy O’Brien was commenting following the release of the latest homelessness figures which counts 9,872 as being homeless, including 3,824 children.

“They make grim reading with no progress made in terms of stemming the flow of families presenting as homeless or moving people out of emergency accommodation into long term housing. 

“Consistent increases in the overall homelessness numbers over the past five years despite regular announcements of plans and strategies have destroyed confidence in the ability of the political system to deliver. 

“People are being turned off politics and politicians by the inability of Government Ministers to keep their promises on housing and to make progress.

“Successive Housing Ministers have launched plan after plan and every single one of them has failed to stem the homelessness crisis.

“You really can’t blame citizens for feeling disenchanted with a political system that continually fails on an issue that, to most people, is easy to fix.

“Building homes for people isn’t rocket science. The State has, in the past, done that, and done it well.

“The twin issues of supply and affordability must be dealt with. Until more public housing comes on stream, we will never truly get ahead on the homelessness crisis.

“It’s now very likely that the 2018 public housing output will barely match the paltry number, less than 800, of public housing units brought on stream in 2017. The Minister must focus on delivery and overcome the clear blockages in the system that are stopping public housing being built.

“The homelessness and overall crises is a scar on Ireland’s record. At what point will Minister Murphy realise that plans aren’t what people want, they want shovels in the ground building homes for the 9,872 mums, dads and children that are languishing today in emergency accommodation,” concluded O’Brien.