Today’s homeless numbers are a result of a government which has deprioritised housing to a degree which is causing severe harm to thousands of people, according to Social Democrats housing spokesperson Rory Hearne.
Deputy Hearne said:
“Today’s figures show there were 16,734 people living in homeless emergency accommodation at the end of December. Shockingly, over 5,000 of them are children, and there has been a worrying increase in the number of elderly people in homelessness.
“The cause of this crisis, which continues to spiral out of control, is government failure to treat this situation with the urgency and gravity it demands and progress policy and legislation that will adequately address what has become a defining disaster for this generation.
“According to Department of Housing data, the main cause of homelessness is evictions from private rental sector landlords and family breakdown, the latter of which is often perpetuated by overcrowding in substandard accommodation.
“Right now, we’re seeing record levels of eviction right across the country – there were 15,000 evictions in the first nine months of last year alone.
“Rather than addressing this trend, the government is introducing disastrous rental measures which will allow landlords to increase rents between tenancies – in the run up to the introduction of this backwards step, we’ve seen a significant increase in the number of evictions.
“Even landlord organisations have acknowledged this fact; tenants are being kicked out of their homes so that landlords can hike up rents before security of tenure laws are enshrined. Government measures will do nothing to prevent existing renters from being made homeless in no fault evictions.
“From March 1st, securing a new tenancy will become more expensive than ever – it’s astonishing that Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael see such a retrograde step as the best they can do to address this emergency.
“Tánaiste Simon Harris needs to stop blaming immigration for homelessness and take responsibility for his government’s failure to prevent thousands of families from being evicted into homelessness.
“It’s past time that the coalition swallows its pride and listens to viable housing solutions, such as the Social Democrats plans for state-led direct delivery of social and affordable housing on a massive scale rather than relying on the market, which will never deliver affordable housing.
“If it continues down the path it’s on, already littered with terrible decisions that are worsening the housing crisis, then a change of government is the only option remaining to get us out of this mess.”
January 30th, 2026