asked the Minister for Local Government when Dublin Corporation will be able to provide accommodation for families of three.
111.
Ceisteanna—Questions. Oral Answers. - Dublin Housing.
110.
asked the Minister for Local Government the minimum size of family now being housed in Dublin city, exclusive of priority cases; and how this compares with the minimum size of family being housed by other housing authorities in the State.
I propose, with your permission, a Cheann Comhairle, to take Questions Nos. 110 and 111 together.
Excluding smaller families who are rehoused by the corporation as a result of being displaced by statutory operations, Dublin Corporation are at present rehousing families of four or more persons. They are not as yet in a position to say when they will be rehousing smaller families, who do not come within priority categories. Depending on housing conditions generally in the area, and the local demand for housing, families of less than four persons are being re-housed by other housing authorities from time to time in various areas of the country.
Does the Minister not consider it to be a dire situation that families of three cannot find local authority housing in the Dublin area?
Yes, the Minister is concerned naturally with the demand for housing in Dublin and is trying, within the finances available to him, to meet the situation as best he can. The corporation's policy in the circumstances is reasonable. That is not to say that I am not concerned about the smaller family who may seem to be in a much weaker position to get a house and may have to wait much longer, and who may in fact feel that they have no chance of ever getting a house from the local authority. I am having a special look at present at this position to see if I could initiate some special housing programme to cater for the needs of very small families so that they will not be left constantly on the side.
Dublin Corporation are the only local authority that cannot house them at the moment.
The only housing problem we have is in the Dublin region.
Deputies may obtain answers to the remaining Questions by applying to the General Office for them.
May I ask——
Question Time is over.
The guillotine has been put on.
Bhí tú ró-mhall.
While written replies will be given to questions already on the Order Paper, what I am concerned about are questions that were put in last Friday and have not appeared at all on the Order Paper on the basis that they were allegedly late and since the deal for questions today seems to have usurped the time that might have been used for questions tomorrow these same questions which would have been in time for tomorrow, naturally with no questions, are not being taken. They are not on today's Order Paper. They were urgent. There is no question of written replies.
The two questions that I am concerned about have to do with the impending visit of the Taoiseach to Mr. Health and the agenda for that meeting. I went to particular pains to make this known in the General Office and I understood that they would be taken. Now I find that technically they are said to have been late, by the Taoiseach's Department. It was they, apparently, who ruled that they were late rather than anybody else. Then with the switch around from tomorrow to today, in so far as double time is concerned, I have been ruled out there as well.
Is it not a fact, and I am sure Deputy Blaney knows it, that all he has to do is to give notice to the Chair and he can raise it on the Adjournment whether it is on the Order Paper or not?
The point is that until I found it was not on the Order Paper today I was not informed that it was late.
He can do it now. He can do it tomorrow.
That is not the point I am raising. If I could get this dealt with then the Deputy and I could deal with that.
The Deputies will be able to obtain answers to these questions by applying to the General Office. Resumption of debate.
A Leas-Cheann Comhairle, is there any explanation for this sort of thing?
The Chair has not any explanation to offer the Deputy in regard to it. The only thing the Chair might suggest to the Deputy is that we still have a debate which is available to Deputies if they feel there are matters about which they wish to complain.
You will see the disability that this imposes in that the answers to the two questions might have furnished information that would be useful to debate. Merely to use the debate to put the questions is not the same thing because, when we come to the answers, that will be the end and the Adjournment of the House.
Now Deputy Blaney knows how Fianna Fáil can twist things.