Joe Walsh
Question:184 Mr. J. Walsh asked the Minister for the Environment the number of people categorised as homeless; and the steps, if any, he is taking to address this problem. [24644/96]
Written Answers. - Homeless Persons.
The 1996 assessment by local authorities showed that 2,501 persons were homeless at 29 March 1996. Details are given in Part IX of my Department's Housing Statistics Bulletin for the September 1996 quarter which is being published today. Copies of the bulletin are being sent to the Oireachtas Library. Measures taken in recent years which directly or indirectly assist in the provision of accommodation for homeless people include the following: the expansion of the local authority housing programme from 1,000 ‘starts' in 1992 to some 3,900 in 1995 and 1996, which benefits approved applicants, including the homeless, for local authority housing; increased capital funding for voluntary bodies providing housing accommodation, a substantial part of which is accommodation for homeless people; increased funding for recoupment by my Department to local authorities in respect of expenditure under section 10 of the Housing Act, 1988 on accommodation of homeless persons; on-going funding for the emergency hostel at Lower Grangegorman in Dublin, operated by the Salvation Army; and the introduction of an after-hours referral service for homeless people in the Dublin-Kildare-Wicklow area seeking accommodation outside normal opening hours.
The Dublin Homelessness Initiative, which I launched in December 1995, got under way in 1996. New administrative structures and arrangements have been established, involving the statutory agencies and voluntary bodies providing services to homeless people, to secure better co-ordination and delivery of services for the homeless in the Dublin area where the problem is greatest. Under the initiative, funding has been made available through Dublin Corporation towards the cost of settlement and hostel-based care and support services operated by voluntary bodies.