Keeping homeless figures down will be 'very difficult', says housing minister
The latest figures show that 4,844 children were in emergency accommodation in May — the highest number ever recorded in Ireland.
James Browne said that it is going to be "very difficult to prevent a crossing of that 5,000 considering how close we are".
As the number of homeless people continues to rise each month, Mr Browne denied that a move to limit access to social housing to non-habitual residents is an attempt to improve optics.
Under the legislation, those who are not habitually resident in Ireland and who do not have the right to remain, will not be able to access homeless supports.
According to the homelessness figures for May, just 51% of those in emergency accommodation are Irish citizens with non-EEA residents accounting for 3,031 people.
Groups such as the Irish Human Rights and Equality Commission (IHREC) previously raised concerns that the legislation would disproportionately impact migrants and ethnic minority communities.
Mr Browne said an individual's immigrant status is not relevant to the matter, saying: "We are talking about people who might arrive in the country, who have not been working here, who have not been living here and then seek social housing supports."
The move to legislate to provide legal and habitual residency as eligibility criteria to access social housing, which was first raised last year, would regularise what already exists on an administrative basis, said Mr Browne.
It is the "right thing to do" and would match current rules for social protection, he continued.
The minister was speaking as details were released showing that 17 local authorities failed to reach their targets on social housing delivery between 2022 and 2024.
Minister of State for local government and planning John Cummins said it is clear which authorities are performing and which are not.
"Some have a can-do attitude, think outside the box, have a clear vision and, to be honest, some don't have those attributes," said Mr Cummins, adding that the system can only move as fast as the slowest cog.
However, when it comes to those local authorities that are under performing, Mr Browne said he would not favour introducing penalties.
When you penalise what is effectively a social service, it is the customers who will end up suffering and not those in charge, he said.
A reward system is being explored for those who are delivering, potentially around the discretionary funding that councillors have available to them as is done in Britain and other countries, Mr Browne said.
Sinn Féin's housing spokesperson Eoin Ó Broin called the Council League Table on social housing delivery a "cheap gimmick" designed to deflect from the Government's failures.
"Government knows that due to their own failures the 2025 social and affordable housing targets cannot be met and are now setting the local authorities up to take the blame come the year's end," said Mr Ó Broin.
Read More
Cork TDs clash over emigration figures as housing crisis forces more young people abroad
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
Irish Independent
an hour ago
- Irish Independent
Letters: After a bit of a panic and an Uber trip, I discovered there are still good people
However, with a few calls to my missing iPhone by a friend, I discovered it was alive and well and in the possession of a lovely lady in Tallaght who had found it when leaving the stadium and took it home with her, waiting for someone to call. I had to get there, and that was where Jimmy came in. A staunch Dublin GAA man who was now aware of my problem, he rang an Uber for me and paid for it from his own account. I refunded him with what cash I had, but it didn't meet the full cost of the taxi. That was the least of his worries – he just wanted to help. So, a trip to Tallaght and a meeting with the lovely Antoinette, who waited at home until I got there, even though she was heading out for the night, and I was reunited with my phone. The relief was tremendous – there is just so much dependence on phones now, not least for the tickets for the two games on Sunday. We hear so much bad news, so I just want to share that there are still a lot of decent people around and I had the pleasure of meeting two of the very best on Saturday night. So, thank you Antoinette and thank you Jimmy. Up the Dubs, Donegal for Sam, and Antoinette and Jimmy, I owe you a few drinks if you want to join me for the celebrations in Tír Chonaill. Jimmy Kavanagh, Letterkenny, Co Donegal EU needs to follow Ireland and ban Jewish settlement goods across the union The continuing scenes of Jewish settlers attacking Palestinians in the West Bank while their brethren in Gaza are being starved, shot and killed needs a worldwide response from all countries that believe in the sanctity of human life and the right to peaceful existence. Last July, the International Court of Justice proffered an advisory opinion that declared Israeli settlements in the West Bank and East Jerusalem were illegal. While it advised all nations to take 'effective measures' that included refraining from any financial, military, technological and economic aid to the state of Israel, it seems the world, or those countries that signed up to the UN Convention on Human Rights, ignored that opinion and wilfully looked the other way. That is, until an Irish senator, Frances Black, upped the ante by introducing the Occupied Territories Bill that would ban Jewish goods and services being sold to the Irish market. Thanks to her crusade, the Government has published the general scheme of the Israeli Settlements in the Occupied Palestinian Territory (Prohibition of Imported Goods) Bill, which hopefully will make its way through the Dáil and Senate without too much opposition. But it needs to be in compliance with EU law. The EU, of which Ireland is a member, must now grab this thorny issue and stop obfuscating. It needs to bring forth comprehensive legislation that will ban Jewish settlement goods from entering the EU while sanctioning and restricting members of the Knesset or members of the Israeli armed forces involved in acts similar to what has been done with Putin and his Russian acolytes. Christy Galligan, Letterkenny, Co Donegal All the blame is on Israel, but it takes two parties to bring peace to the table In reference to your editorial ('Netanyahu must be stopped, and only the US has the power to do it', July 1), all the blame for the war in Gaza seems to be on Israel. Hamas started this terrible campaign by killing over 1,200 innocent Israelis, including over 300 young people at the Nova Music Festival. They still hold 50 hostages, of whom less than half are believed to be alive. The war could be ended tomorrow if Hamas released the hostages and let the Palestinian people rebuild their lives. Peace needs two sides to want it to work, not one calling for destruction and promising to repeat October 7. Anthony Costello, Galway Why is definition of hate speech determined by the US, UK and Israel? I note a strange discomfort in 'official' Ireland, as if when we speak of people like Kneecap or our Northern brothers it's as 'the other'. Keir Starmer has bent over backwards to salve Israeli outrage over certain words uttered by Kneecap. Should Johnny Cash's song about shooting a man in Reno just to watch him die be banned? Or is outrage confined to the Jewish community alone? Recently at Ibrox Stadium in Glasgow a large banner was unfurled with a picture of a shotgun seeking the death of Irish people. Outrage and charged with hate crime? No. Interestingly, Taoiseach Micheál Martin commented on Kneecap, but is silent on the Ibrox banner. This month, we will have marching bands extolling the deaths, knee-deep in blood, of Fenians. In other words, us Irish. Has Mr Starmer, or indeed Mr Martin, a view on this? Hate speech, incitement to hatred, or is all hate confined towards what the UK, US and Israel term hate? John Cuffe, Co Meath If J1 students don't like the 'bad food' in America, it's not Donald Trump's fault I refer to the headline on an online article on Monday ('It's just bad food. Meat is completely different. Dairy too. I miss the butter': the reality of life as a J1 student in Trump's America). First, if the poor things think the food in Trump's America is bad, they should get on the next plane home so that their mammy can butter their toast and tuck them in at bedtime. Second, your paper's bias and Trump derangement syndrome (TDS) is disgusting as you tie one person's whingeing to all of America, specifically Trump's America. You couldn't resist taking a poke at the guy, as if since the day he took office the recipes have all changed, no matter that some of the foodstuffs were probably harvested and packaged during the Joe Biden era, like butter. I don't expect you to publish this as it goes against your editorial TDS bias. If a foreign student made the same complaint about the food in Micheál Martin's Ireland after consuming a greasy burger and chips on the way home from a night in the pub, you'd be up in arms. What has happened to Ireland?
Irish Examiner
5 hours ago
- Irish Examiner
Sarah Harte: Limiting freedom of speech is a threat to a functioning democracy
The poet and public intellectual Thomas McCarthy told me this week that he thought the Western World was depressed. One depressing and alarming development is the erosion of freedom of speech. Censorship is proliferating in front of our eyes, and it's reached our shores with real-life consequences for our adult children. America, no longer the land of the brave and the free, is where Irish J1 students will have their social media posts checked going back five years. There is something surreal about this. Big Brother is watching you but not even bothering to hide it. Last week, it was reported in the Irish Examiner that visa applicants must 'list all social media usernames or handles of every platform they have used from the last five years on the DS-160 visa application form.' Privacy settings on all social media platforms must be set to public. Talk about having a chilling effect on freedom of speech among a crop of young people who have just come of voting age. We need their young voices. I chatted to a retired senior judge about this last weekend, and he was horrified by the development. As he said, bad things like this happen incrementally, until one day you wake up to a knock on the door and think, 'Jesus, how did we get here?' Workers stand handcuffed after being arrested by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, ICE, at Delta Downs Racetrack, Hotel and Casino in Calcasieu Parish, near Vinton, Louisiana last month. Photo: U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement via AP Both the Taoiseach and the Tánaiste have expressed concern. Simon Harris intends to raise the matter with the new US Ambassador next month. Micheál Martin has stated that he disagrees with the measures. In reality, the American Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) now essentially reject travellers to the United States who are not ideologically in line with the regime. The parameters of what is considered dissent against the regime seem broad and vague. Imagine if we checked the phones of American tourists in Dublin and said, 'No, sorry, you don't get to see the Cliffs of Moher or the Book of Kells because we see from your social media posts that you deny the genocide in Gaza and you seem supportive of Benjamin Netanyahu'. What the hell has happened to America with its modern-day version of McCarthyism restraining people who hold opposing views? Are all lessons from the past being lost? Barack Obama, who has frustrated many Democrats with his relative silence on a range of subjects in the USA, issued a warning a week ago that America is dangerously close to losing its democracy. Except it's not just in America that this censorship is taking place. Kneecap fans at Glastonbury at the weekend. Following the festival, British police are considering whether to launch criminal investigations into the hip hop group and punk duo Bob Vylan. Freedom of speech has been under relentless attack in the UK. Their Public Order Act 1986 is capable of broad interpretation. In tandem with two further acts of 2002 and 2022, it effectively allows policing to be politicised with jokes, social media posts, and even private conversations arguably coming within their dragnet. Following the Glastonbury Festival last weekend, British police are considering whether to launch criminal investigations into two acts: the Irish hip-hop group Kneecap and the punk duo Bob Vylan. One of the members of Bob Vylan chanted 'Death, death, to the IDF'. The police announced the possibility of an investigation on Saturday on X. You might not like what someone says, but you may want to ensure that people still have the right to say it. The question is, where does cultural resistance and performance (including satire) end and terrorism or incitement to hatred begin? This is not an easy question to answer, but it is a vitally important one. While 'Glasto' was going on, John Brennan, former Director of the CIA, addressed a summer school for the Law Society's Centre for Justice and Law Reform in Dublin. It was on the theme 'Defending Democracy: Legal Responses to Emerging Threats'. He remarked on the 'delicate balance' faced by governments in permitting free speech while prohibiting hate speech and incitement to violence. We've had a back-and-forth on this ourselves, with hate speech laws being dropped last year by former minister for justice Helen McEntee due to a lack of consensus on the thorny issue. I have found myself flip-flopping on the subject, but I have come to believe that we should probably be wary of hate speech laws for fear of stifling public discourse. Kneecap It is precisely because clamping down on freedom of expression is taken so seriously by human rights lawyers that Kneecap's frontman, Liam Óg Ó hAnnaidh, who performs under the name Mo Chara, has attracted an extraordinarily heavyweight legal team defending him in his alleged terrorism offence. He was charged last month for allegedly displaying a flag in support of Iran-backed militant group Hezbollah at a concert in November 2024. He has firmly denied the charge but is currently on bail. Ó hAnnaidh's legal team (Kneecap call them An Scoithfhoireann or the Dream Team) is a roll call of who's who in human rights law, including Gareth Peirce, who formerly represented the Guildford Four and the Birmingham Six. Peirce has devoted decades to defending underdogs. Critics see her as destabilising the establishment and undermining national security, which is the catch-all rationale that the Americans are using now to reject visa applications or even detain people. Peirce has spoken in the past about the dangers of stigmatising people as a threat to national security when they're not, and 'how justice dies when the law is co-opted for political purposes'. Gareth Peirce avoids the media like the plague, but in an old interview, she said: 'We take it on trust that if the government suspects people of terrorism and locks them up, or puts them on control orders without charge, they must be terrorists.' When a political context is as febrile as it is now, it is more likely that governments will dismantle fundamental freedoms, and we won't question what is really going on. Could this crackdown be a reaction or an attempted distraction from the allegation that the British state has failed to uphold international law and arguably been complicit in genocide through its supply of arms to Israel? Either way, the trial promises to be an important test of the principle of freedom of expression. At Glastonbury, Liam Óg Ó hAnnaidh accused Israel of genocide and led the crowd in a chant of "free, free Palestine' as well as anti-Starmer chants. The anti-Starmer chants were explained by British Prime Minister Keir Starmer's remarks last week when he said that it was 'not appropriate' for Kneecap to appear at Glastonbury. Michael Eavis and his daughter Emily, who run the famous festival, were said to have been pressurised not to let them play. At Glastonbury, Liam Óg Ó hAnnaidh accused Israel of genocide and led the crowd in a chant of 'free, free Palestine' as well as anti-Starmer chants. Photo: Yui Mok/PA Meanwhile, in Germany, you can't hold a pro-Palestine demonstration without risking arrest and being accused of anti-Semitism. The Irish writer, Naoise Dolan, has spoken about being detained twice in Berlin for attending pro-Palestinian demonstrations. We're fortunate enough to live in a country where freedom of speech is protected in our Constitution. We received a positive school report from the Democracy Index last year, indicating that we have a fully functioning democracy and are expected to perform well in the 2025 Index. Let's keep it that way because we need dissenting voices now more than ever.
RTÉ News
6 hours ago
- RTÉ News
Harris to tell forum that 10% US tariffs are 'new normal'
Tánaiste Simon Harris will tell a trade forum today that US tariffs of 10% on exports from Ireland will be the "new normal" but that efforts are continuing to agree zero for zero taxes in some key areas. The meeting takes place a week before the scheduled lifting of a pause on higher tariffs by the US president Donald Trump. The Government's forum is comprised of State agencies, business groups, unions and senior ministers. At present most Irish exports to the US now have tariffs of 10%. But there are significant exceptions including Ireland's pharmaceuticals sector and computer chip manufacturers. Those arrangements were in place temporarily pending a trade deal between the US and EU but they could now become permanent. The EU is reportedly negotiating to keep some sectors free of tariffs and accepting 10% duties on other goods. Today's meeting will also hear an update on the new strategy for the computer chip industry. The forum will also receive an economic assessment of impact of tariffs from Minister for Finance Paschal Donohoe. There will also be discussion about how Irish companies can diversify into new markets. Ahead of the meeting, the Tánaiste said Ireland needed an agreement "that has zero-for-zero or as near as possible in as many areas as possible". "We cannot ignore the fact that every single day the trading relationship between the EU and the US is worth more than €4 billion," Mr Harris said.
