Sinn Féin TD Dessie Ellis has called on the government to declare a "housing emergency" in Ireland.

He made the call after figures from Focus Ireland revealed there are currently 6,525 homeless people and 1,130 are families.

He said: "This is an extremely worrying situation as the Focus Ireland report says that 2015 was the worst year so far for family homelessness and all indicators are showing that 2016 will be worse.

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"A private sector solution to this emergency will not be able to deal with the upward trend of homelessness. That is why we must look beyond the private sector and towards Government and council intervention to provide the long term solution to this crisis - they need to build more houses.

"Once again I will reiterate my call for the government to call a housing emergency and immediately start funding local authorities who can then contribute positively in solving what has become a byword for the inability of a government to help its citizens to a basic right - housing."

(CD/MH)