We warned the Government when it decided to go through with the cold-hearted decision to lift the no fault eviction ban on 1 April that it would lead to a spike in homelessness. The figures that came out last Friday, conveniently enough for the Government before the weekend but we need to consider them, show a significant rise in the rate of homelessness in the first month after that no fault eviction ban was lifted. Worst of all, it shows a dramatic jump in the number of families and children who are homeless. We now have the shocking record number of 12,259 people homeless, and 3,594 of them are children. In the past month, the number of families going into homelessness increased by 94 with 122 children among them. These are children who have been put through the trauma and hardship of being made homeless because, in many cases, of an eviction where the families have done absolutely nothing wrong. They have been thrown into emergency accommodation. Will the Taoiseach not accept this has been a disastrous decision? This is just the beginning because the Government staggered the end of the eviction ban, which means this will escalate.

All the signs are that this already disastrous situation of record numbers of individuals, families and, worst of all, children, will increase and increase. The Government needs to reinstate the eviction ban.

I know what the Taoiseach will say. He will say we have the tenant in situ scheme and that is what the Government is doing to stop evictions. I remind the Taoiseach it was the Opposition that proposed that scheme. We had to fight with the Government for two years for it to introduce it but in many cases, although we are getting some success, it is not working because big investors in particular, as well as corporate landlords, even though they are evicting people on the grounds they are selling a property, when the local authority approaches them to say it wants to buy those properties, they are just saying, "No". Something needs to be done about that. That is what is happening in Tathony House, where 35 families and households are threatened with eviction. The landlord is just ignoring the council. He wants to go through with the eviction and is refusing to engage on the issue of purchase. I have raised other similar cases with the Taoiseach in recent times.

The Government's policies are not working. It is not rational to say it will be worse in a few months' time if we reinstate the eviction ban because, in a sense, that suggests the Government's plans to deliver more affordable and public housing will not actually be realised. Will the Government reinstate the no-fault eviction ban? Will it ensure there is first refusal for local authorities and approved housing bodies that are trying to buy properties to prevent families and children being made homeless?

As I indicated to Deputy McDonald, we have had two temporary eviction bans in Ireland. One was introduced by the previous Government, which I led during the pandemic, and the other was introduced by this Government last year. What did we learn from those two eviction bans? At best, they reduce the number of people who are homeless in the short term. The most recent eviction ban did not even do that. Homelessness and the number of people in emergency accommodation continued to rise almost every month that the second eviction ban was in place. At best, an eviction ban reduces homelessness in the short term but probably does not even do that. What does it do? It makes the situation worse in the medium term. When the ban is lifted, there is a glut of eviction notices that then get affected. In the long term, it makes it even worse again because fewer people are willing to offer properties for rent on the private rental market. It is a policy that, at best, might work in the short term but does not always, and it make things worse in the medium and long term. For those reasons, it does not make sense for the Government to do that a third time.

What we can do is support the tenant in situ scheme, through which 1,500 homes are being bought from landlords who are selling up; provide resources for homelessness prevention to local authorities and NGOs to make sure people get the advice they need, especially if an invalid notice to quit has been served on them, which is very common; and continue to ramp up the supply of social housing. More such housing was built last year than any year since the 1970s. We will build even more this year.

Once people enter into homelessness, it is very hard to get out of it. I will respond to something the Taoiseach said earlier. I have raised multiple cases, including that of a woman who is working, ironically, looking after vulnerable children, who has been in homeless accommodation and sharing a bedroom with her son for four years. That is what happens when people enter homelessness, in many cases. It is very hard to get out of it. It is absolutely imperative that the Government stops as many people ending up in that situation as possible, when they have done nothing wrong.

Let us be clear. While the eviction ban was in place, homelessness continued to increase but at a much slower rate. There was a 0.4% increase in children going into homelessness in November, but it was 2.9% last month. In other words, it had more than quadrupled in the first month the Government lifted the eviction ban. To add to that, as I said, there are now landlords who are refusing tenant in situ purchases. Even though they are getting the right to evict on the grounds they are selling, when the council asks whether they will sell to prevent a family getting evicted they say, "No", because they can make more money by evicting people. It is absolute greed.

Will the Government recognise that lifting the ban has made the situation worse and give teeth to purchases under the tenant in situ scheme to prevent people going into homelessness?

The truth is any time a temporary measure is introduced, there comes a point where that measure has to end. There is then a snapback, bounce-back or an effect where numbers rise. The Minister for Housing, Local Government and Heritage, Deputy Darragh O'Brien, made it very clear, on the week he proposed we have a temporary eviction ban, that there would be an uptick once it was lifted.

That is inevitable and is one of the problems, of course. We had a short-term ban, which did not reduce the numbers in emergency accommodation, and the inevitable happened when it was lifted. It does not work in the medium or long term and barely works in the short term. That is what we have learned from the second eviction ban. For the first one, the circumstances were different. Pandemic restrictions were in place and that is what actually reduced the numbers then, rather than the ban being in place.

I agree with the Deputy on one thing, which is that the best thing we can do is prevent people from ending up in homelessness in the first place. That is why we are going to power and repower the tenant in situ scheme to make sure it works. That is why we are continuing to build more social housing and are funding local authorities and NGOs to engage with people in order that they know their rights and we can prevent them becoming homeless in the first place.