Senators have four minutes, with the Minister to reply no later than 7.05 p.m. It might be a bit later than that but we will continue the debate now with An Seanadóir Joe Flaherty.

I welcome the Minister back to the Chamber. At the outset, I commend him on all the work he has been doing. I think he has made some of the most significant strides we have seen in trying to address the housing deficit in this country, possibly over the past 15 to 20 years. I commend him on his work and tell him not to listen to detractors and keep doing what he is doing because I think he is making real progress. We have certainly seen that in the first quarter this year.

Notwithstanding that, we have to admit that we still have a homelessness challenge. The numbers, at face value, do not reflect well on us as a society. Every family is entitled to a home and a roof over their heads but sometimes, we do not get sufficient credit, or indeed the Minister's Department does not get sufficient credit, in those figures. It is not necessarily the same 15,000 every month that is homeless. There are an awful lot of people coming into the system homeless and who are then coming out the other side quite quickly, as a matter of fact, in a home and a proper, secure social housing support at home. There are an awful lot of people across local authorities the length and breadth of Ireland working very hard in homeless services, often in combined teams across a number of counties, to address this. They are working tirelessly to address that.

The Minister might use his time to paint a picture of the dynamic of that homeless figure of 15,000. What makes that up? How many people are in the system over the long term? It would be reasonable to say that there are very few. You could probably count on your two hands the number of families who are more than 12 months in a homeless situations. In many of those cases, I think it would be reasonable to say that some of those people would probably have status issues in the country and it might be a challenge getting them out of homelessness.

On the whole, I think we are making real progress. Ultimately, the solution to homelessness and all our housing problems is delivery. It is like any business in retail; if you have not got the product, you cannot sell it, and if you have not got the houses, you cannot sort homelessness or get people into housing. However, I think the Minister has shown that there is no restriction on his ambition. He has not been afraid to take on new programmes and initiatives. He has shown that this week with teach beag, which is a great initiative. Needless to say, the critics will deride it but it answers what an awful lot of parents were asking us for. I could probably count ten times the people who have come to me and asked if it would be okay if they put up a modular unit in the field behind the house or the back garden. I told them that if they went to the planner, they will tell you no but if your neighbours are not going to make an issue with it you are probably as well to do it. It is great to see those people being brought in and that their situation is going to be regularised. This not a panacea; it is not going to sort out the homelessness problem but it is just one more measure the Minister has been willing to embrace. I know within our party and indeed with the other parties, he is having ongoing discussions and taking on board ideas. We have a collective responsibility, ultimately, to sort the homelessness problem. We will get there but we also have to acknowledge that we are one of the fastest growing, most dynamic economies and countries in Europe. It is inevitable that our population is going to increase. It is increasing dramatically and is putting additional pressures on our housing stock and supply.

Ultimately, it comes back down to that most salient point: everything humanly possible has to be done to ramp up supply. At the minute, we are totally dependent on the Minister's Department. There is probably not a housing development in the country that is not dependent on state aid through an element of social and affordable housing to get it off the ground. When people say the Government is doing nothing about the housing problem and homelessness, it is simply not true. It is a fallacy and very unfair to the Minister's Department, officials and the local authorities the length and breadth of the country.

I welcome the Minister to the Chamber and thank him for coming in again to conclude this important debate on homelessness. As Senator Flaherty said, I think it is agreed by everyone in both Houses that homelessness can only be solved by building more houses. That is just a fact. The figures for 2025 were very much welcomed and we obviously have targets to hit over the next four years and the lifetime of this Government. I have no doubt that the work the Minister's Department is doing is to achieve those targets and hopefully go beyond them. Certainly, last year's figures were quite positive and give us positivity going forward.

There was good progress on social and affordable accommodation, which is extremely important for what we are talking about. There was good progress on cost rental, with 6,000 houses. That cost rental provides accommodation for people at a value 25% below the market value, which gives people much more options and flexibility in regard to where they live. We want to see that ramped up; the Minister does too, I am sure. Again, 6,000 houses is quite significant.

As the Minister himself knows, we see the monthly figures of homelessness increase and it is upsetting. It is almost a stick that is thrown at the Government sometimes when you see social media posts and protests. Homelessness is always talked about and that there are 15,000 to 17,000 in homelessness. It is portrayed as 16,000 or 17,000 Irish people who are homeless. It does not matter whether it is Irish or non-Irish; it is not right and we want to house everyone. However, it is not a true reflection of the situation. It does not take into account the increased population from inward migration and people we need to protect and support. I think 40% of that figure, or just over 40%, are Irish citizens who are in emergency accommodation but obviously we want to support everyone.

On a personal level - and I am sure the Minister is the same - it is incredibly upsetting when you see children and families in emergency accommodation, whether that is families with one single mother or families with two parents.

The fact there are children in emergency accommodation is incredibly upsetting. It is why, when the action plan was announced in November, it was really welcome that child and family homelessness was prioritised in that action plan. I know the Minister launched a public consultation - in January, I think it was - on that child and family homelessness action plan. I think the consultation finished in February. Seeing as the Minister is in the Chamber today, will he outline in his response where that is at the moment? I know the action plan is meant to be completed by quarter 2 of 2026. We have started that and we are not near the end of quarter 2 of 2026, obviously. The consultation finished in February. In my view, it is one of the most critical parts of that action plan for homelessness. What has the Department been doing since the public consultation finished in February?

I have been keeping an eye on it since the announcement in November but, since February, I have not seen too much happening. I am sure there is something happening behind the scenes but I certainly have not seen what progress has happened since February. Will the Minister outline what has been done in the Department since that public consultation closed because it has been six months since the announcement of the action plan. Every month, we see the figures increase. Every month, we see more children in emergency accommodation.

We always have deadline figures of things to meet but, for this, it is critical that we have it completed by 2026. Obviously, it needs to be expedited, it needs to be prioritised and there need to be targeted measures in that space. I am sure the Minister, his Department and Cabinet are doing everything to try to improve the national figures of homelessness, but particularly, from a personal point of view, child homelessness needs to be prioritised. I welcome that was part of the announcement in November but we are six months on and we really need to see that being delivered and progressed by the Department. I am interested to hear the Minister's response on that.

I thank the Minister for coming back in. I was just about to speak when he was called to a vote last week. Homelessness has been a crisis for the past decade, all the way back to the early 2000s. Hundreds and hundreds of articles with crisis in the headline can be found. It is not a crisis anymore; it is normality. There were 17,308 people recorded in emergency accommodation as of February 2026. That is a 13% increase in just one year. Month after month, year after year, the numbers keep climbing. This does not account for hidden homelessness, such as the young person who is couch surfing and the two or three generations of families doubling up in overcrowded homes or the couple in a mobile home behind a hedge. It is estimated that as many as 290,000 people in Ireland could be living like this, unseen and uncounted.

Something that needs to be addressed is that the number of homeless deaths is only recorded in Dublin. How can we address a crisis when we do not even understand the full picture? We need to know the mortality rate for those outside of Dublin. Our councillor in Limerick, Sarah Beasley, has raised this time and again. If the Government is not even willing to count the homelessness, what does that say about how their lives are valued? Homeless does not mean worthless. I would like a response from the Minister on why the Department is not recording the number of homeless deaths outside of Dublin city.

The housing crisis is stunting the lives of people across the country. There are couples who are desperate to move out of their parents' homes and start a family but they cannot find anywhere to live. Affordability is a massive issue but many people who want to build have been denied planning permission for the most nonsensical reasons. I am working with a couple in Kildare who are trying to build on land beside their parents' home and have been denied planning permission because of population targets set by the local authority. That policy was set by the Minister's Department. To me, that is absolutely outrageous and the Government needs to remove all red tape for people who are desperately trying to house themselves.

It is a shocking contrast to the Minister's plans to build seven super-sized IPAS centres, which will supersede regular planning regulations. The Government had previously said this planning circumvention was an emergency measure to cope with the war in Ukraine and it would be removed, but now the Government is moving full steam ahead to copper-fasten it within legislation. The Government will apply one rule for us regular folk and another rule for itself. I have a question for the Minister on modular housing. What state are we at with legislation for modular units in back gardens? If the Minister wants, he could fast-track this legislation and provide some relief to people who find themselves without anywhere to go.

I thank the Senators for their very significant contributions on the last day and again today. It is a very difficult topic because it is one that is very close to every single one of us as elected representatives and it impacts on every corner of the country in many ways. I really appreciate the time taken by people to give voice to people impacted by precarious living, homelessness and a lack of secure tenancy. Those voices are fundamental to any discussion on this issue.

I want to be very clear, as I believe I always am with this issue, that addressing homelessness and increasing the supply of homes required to do that is my absolute priority. The programme for Government recommitted to working towards ending homelessness by 2030. To meet this commitment, Delivering Homes, Building Communities was developed as an integrated housing and homelessness plan. I was determined to ensure that how we tackle homelessness was at the heart of the work of the action plan. It has to be and I feel very strongly about that. The new housing action plan is based on two key pillars: activating the supply of 300,000 more homes and supporting people to have a home of their own. The plan will ensure that the funding and the strategies deployed to address housing and homelessness are fully aligned at all times.

Increased supply is key to addressing homelessness. This Government is focused on making sure that everyone has access to quality, affordable, warm, safe and secure homes that suit their needs. Previously, the Minister of State, Deputy O’Sullivan, spoke to the actions in the plan focused on increasing supply, with over €9 billion in capital funding being made available for housing in 2026 alone. In addition, we are progressing significant measures to improve both security of tenure and supply in the rental market through the new rental legislation and the regulation of short term lets. The new rental legislation has introduced significantly stronger tenant protections by massively restricting no-fault evictions for new tenancies created on or after 1 March 2026. The current provision for tenancies of unlimited duration has been strengthened by the incorporation of tenancies of minimum duration of six years. In addition, the regulation of short-term lets will bring back a proportion of the houses and apartments which are being used for short-term letting purposes to the traditional long-term rental market, thereby helping to ease the accommodation shortage pressures. Measures and actions already under way are having an impact and I want to see more and faster. I am determined to get this right as quickly as possible for every single person and their family in a precarious living situation or accessing homelessness supports in the State.

Supported by the increased social housing delivery and supports such as HAP, more than 6,500 adults were helped to exit emergency accommodation in the last two years. This is important to recognise. It is real work that has been done by local authorities, as supported by staff and working with many charities and NGOs in the area who do incredible work to provide pathways for people to engage with services in an appropriate way for each individual case. It is extremely sensitive work. In addition to this, more than 9,000 adults were prevented from entering emergency accommodation in the same period, including through significant investment in tenant in situ acquisitions and tenancy sustainment measures.

The housing plan recognises that delivery alone is not enough. Despite a significant increase in new homes being delivered and the high number of people supported to exit homelessness, the number of households, including families with children in homeless emergency accommodation, has continued to rise. I do not accept this as the status quo. In order to see the number of people experiencing homelessness fall, there must be an increased availability of homes for households at risk of homelessness, not only as an exit pathway but also to prevent people from needing to access emergency accommodation in the first place. I am working with each local authority to examine how the allocations of these new social homes will best address the needs of households experiencing homelessness and, in particular, families with children. Under Delivering Homes, Building Communities, each local authority will prepare a new housing delivery action plan, HDAP, reflecting local need identified, including within the housing needs and demand assessment framework. Within this broad framework, evidence-informed local authority HDAPs provide a detailed picture of the quantum, type, size, and location of social homes to be delivered by local authorities and AHBs.

Learning from the first round of these plans will help to inform and strengthen the next iteration of plans and set clear targets against which local authority and AHB delivery will be benchmarked to 2030. This will include minimum targets for quantity, type and size of social homes and, for example, identifying housing for priority groups, including disabled persons.

Prevention of homelessness in the first instance is an absolute priority. In that context, there are many preventions initiatives already under way in my Department and across the Government. This includes the provision of social and affordable housing, HAP and homeless HAP and our strong tenancy protection legislation. In addition, we support local authorities in providing services prevention services through significant funding each year. The level of expenditure on prevention services rose from €15.4 million in 2021 to €24.7 million in 2024, an increase of €9.3 million. It is now 7% of the total homelessness budget. In order to ensure a fully aligned all-of-government approach under the plan, we are developing a national homelessness prevention framework within which homelessness can be prevented in a structured and planned way with tailored prevention measures for each potential at-risk cohort.

It is also important that appropriate supports are provided to households exiting emergency accommodation to mitigate their risk of re-entering homelessness. With this in mind, the framework will have regard to the reasons for presentation to homelessness. In order to drive the development of the prevention framework, a steering group comprising senior departmental officials has been established. The framework will be in place this year.

We are developing a child and family homelessness action plan, bringing together key stakeholders to drive the continued focus on preventing children and families entering emergency accommodation, providing enhanced supports for children experiencing homelessness, as well as measures to accelerate exits and reduce the time spent by children and their families in homeless emergency accommodation. To better inform the action plan, we have invited input from all stakeholders. An online consultation to inform the plan was held in January. There was also an in-person event that was attended by more than 100 stakeholders from Departments, State bodies and NGOs. The plan is being drafted. It is anticipated that it will be published by the end of quarter 2 of this year.

Since October of last year, I have written to and met with chief executives of local authorities to ensure that all necessary actions are taken to make sure that families longest in emergency accommodation are provided with housing solutions. I want to see them all utilising the various options open to local authorities, including HAP, RAS and the allocation of local authority and AHB homes, to exit these families from emergency accommodation. To further support this, funding of €150 million has been ring-fenced for acquisitions. In addition, recognising that domestic violence can lead to family homelessness, under the new plan, a protocol will be agreed with local authorities to provide that victims of domestic violence can transfer previous time spent on a social housing waiting list to another local authority, subject to meeting all social housing eligibility requirements.

Housing first is another key policy response in our efforts to reduce homelessness among our most vulnerable individuals. A key initiative under this plan will be the further expansion of the housing first programme to create 2,000 tenancies. An updated implementation plan will specify targets for each local authority for housing first tenancies in the coming months. Housing first has been an important policy response in our efforts to reduce homelessness amongst our most vulnerable. By deliberately targeting those at the sharpest edge of homelessness, the programme demonstrates that homelessness is a problem that can be eradicated.

The success of this programme is due in no small part to the partnerships that have been formed on an inter-departmental, inter-agency and local basis between housing and health services and service providers in the NGO sector. The plan also recognises that individuals experiencing homelessness with complex support-needs often become entrenched in emergency homeless services. Under the plan, the Department of Health will provide increased health support to households experiencing homelessness by means of the implementation of the HSE national strategic plan to improve the health of people experiencing homelessness. We had a youth homelessness strategy in place for the past three years, which introduced a range of new measures to address homelessness among those aged 18 to 24, including supported housing for youth and shared accommodation schemes. There is more to do in this space, and our new housing plan contains a commitment in respect of a continued focus on youth homelessness. I will be establishing a subgroup under the auspices of my national homeless action committee to focus specifically on youth homelessness.

Budget 2026 provides a total allocation of €563.5 million to address homelessness. This includes €513.5 million in current funding to ensure local authorities can provide sufficient emergency accommodation and essential related services, including housing first supports, homelessness prevention supports, day services, and tenancy sustainment measures. In addition, €50 million in capital funding will allow local authorities to invest in the provision of local authority or NGO-owned emergency accommodation facilities, developing a more sustainable approach to the delivery of emergency accommodation and ensuring that services are tailored for the needs of clients.

The housing plan recognises that an all-of-government approach is required to tackle the issues in this space. It is not a one-size-fits-all scenario. We have to work together to support the co-ordination of the response to homeless issues by Government and the national homeless action committee, which I chair, and which was established in 2021. The overarching objective of the committee is to ensure that a renewed emphasis is brought to collaborating across government. I do not underestimate the scale of the challenge in front of us. I will call out where work is not happening. However, we will engage deliberately where alignment goes off course to ensure it is back on course. In short, I will not accept a lack of ambition or stasis in decision-making in get things moving. Tackling this crisis demands new ways of working, with faster but always transparent decision-making and a relentless focus on delivery to deliver the homes we need.

That concludes the debate. I thank the Minister for coming back to the House following the vote in the Dáil.