Labour has accused an Irish Socialist Party politician of continuing to "play political football" over the homelessness and housing issues in Ireland.

Labour TD Eric Byrne said Ruth Coppinger prefers "perpetual protest" to actually delivering homes and solutions for families affected by the crisis.

Mr Byrne said: "It was incredible to hear her, in effect, defending the record of previous Fianna Fail governments who ended social housing programmes and left the current government to clear up the mess they made of the housing and construction sectors.

-- Advertisement --

"It's clear that the long-term solution to homelessness is to increase the supply of homes. Minister Alan Kelly and Labour in government secured the largest ever state investment in social housing of €3.8 billion up to 2020. "This investment of billions of euro in housing will allow for the construction of 35,000 new social housing units and the utilisation of up to 75,000 private sector units to meet housing needs.

"Cathal Morgan, Chief Executive of the Dublin Regional Homeless Executive, urged people to support the modular housing programme as an important short-term response for families who are currently homeless. Yet, the AAA has slammed the modular housing programme.

"Their hypocrisy on housing knows no bounds. Various AAA representatives have opposed social housing developments at local level. In Dublin City Council, Labour councillors were proposing a package on the property tax that included a funding provision of €5.6m for homeless services. These proposals were rejected, including by Sinn Fein and the various hard-left councillors."

(CD/MH)