Election 2024: 'Nothing honest' about Fianna Fáil's approach to housing — Eoin Ó Broin
Sinn Féin housing spokesman Eoin Ó Broin: 'Darragh O'Brien has consistently missed his social housing targets, targets that were too low in the first place.' Picture: Sasko Lazarov/RollingNews
There is "nothing honest" about Fianna Fáil's approach to housing, the Sinn Fein housing spokesman has said.
Eoin Ó Broin was speaking after Housing Minister Darragh O'Brien said that he could not release last month's homelessness figures ahead of next Friday's election date.
Homelessness figures are released on the last Friday of the month at around 2pm.
That means that this month's will be released in the middle of voting, after many people have already cast their ballot.
Asked on Thursday if he would release the figures on Thursday, Mr O'Brien said this was not possible, but denied it was due to a lack of transparency.
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"I couldn't, because the figures have to be independently verified.
"And it will be done like every single other month, at exactly the same time on the last Friday of the month. No change on that whatsoever, and completely transparent."
Mr Ó Broin hit out at those comments, saying that the widespread expectation is that the figures will hit new record highs, something which had become standard under the current government.
"I think people know that Darragh O'Brien is the Minister for homelessness.
"So while I think it would be better if we published them on Thursday, I think most people are expecting the numbers will rise.
"We will have more adults, more children, more pensioners, more singles, and more families in emergency accommodation than ever before.
"Why? Because Darragh O'Brien has consistently missed his social housing targets, targets that were too low in the first place and isn't delivering a sufficient volume affordable homes."
Mr Ó Broin said that even those figures which are published only take in those in emergency accommodation.
"They don't publish, for example, women and children in Tusla accommodation. They don't publish figures for men and women in hostels not funded by the state. But yes, I think it would be the right thing for them to do to publish the figures earlier.
"I think the entire position of Fianna Fail in particular in housing is dishonest, but there's not a snowball's chance in hell that Darryl Brown will publish those figures before polls open on Friday. Why? Because he knows the figures are going up."
The number of people living in emergency accommodation reached a record of 14,760 in September, according to the latest figures from the Department of Housing.
The figures include 10,199 adults and 4,561 children.
These numbers mark a 1.9% increase on the previous month, where a total of 14,486 people were homeless.
