Bríd Smith urges eviction ban for Travellers during COVID crisis

Thank you. Last night at 10 o'clock I submitted an amendment to go on the floor today and I was immediately told it was too late. I knew it was too late because at half past seven I received an email telling me that I had to have the amendments in by nine o'clock. But at half past seven I was here embroiled in the debate around the mother and baby homes. Now I had a complaint to the Cairn Comhairle this morning about this and I was told that the business committee agreed nine o'clock as the deadline on the evening before. I can't corroborate that but I can tell you it wouldn't have, I know the staff are very busy but it wouldn't have killed somebody to send that email that they send out at half past seven last night giving you an hour and a half notice for the deadline for your amendments to have sent it out if and when the agreement was made. Anyway, that's my complaint about it. But I just want to read the amendment I would have submitted, identical, in fact copied and pasted from the amendment that we achieved to get into the last emergency measures when we passed them back in March, emergency measures in the public interest and they basically cover all proposed evictions in tenancies in the state. For the avoidance of doubt included local authority and approved housing bodies and for the avoidance of doubt included all travellers currently resident in any location should not during the crisis be evicted from that location except where movement is required to ameliorate hardship. Well, there's a lot of hardship among the traveller community and I know the Irish traveller movement have written to you recently and they've made a very, I would say very well argued and thought out plea for you to put a ban on evictions of any travellers for the duration of the crisis. In fact, in the last few weeks there has been significant rise of COVID infection in the travelling community and the degree of protection that was given to travellers not to be evicted during the existence of the last eviction ban. I want to ask you now Minister tonight, will you give that protection to them again? I support the amendment to increase it to six months but even as it stands, will the non-eviction of travellers apply for whatever duration we end up with and I hope we end up getting this amendment passed. It's really, really important, particularly because this is an extremely vulnerable group and the sort of chronic diseases that they're at risk of arise mostly from the conditions they live in. It's often damp and cold, lacking proper sanitation, water facilities, no ability to heat their homes, etc. And the homes leave a lot to be desired for hundreds of families and over 3,000 children who are living in inadequate conditions. And a lot of these conditions lead to the sort of things that COVID goes after, the vulnerability that involves chronic lung diseases, pulmonary diseases, heart conditions, cystic fibrosis, asthma, that's what COVID loves, it goes after that vulnerability. And a lot of children and adults living in traveller accommodation are very susceptible to this problem. There is a huge level of homelessness among the travelling community, it is over-represented as a proportion of the entire population. And I think you know this Minister, that most travelling, most homeless accommodation is up to 10% of all homelessness is made up from the travelling community. And I think that this has to be in your radar, that travellers will not be evicted for the period of time and I hope it's the six months. I am raging that I wasn't allowed to put my amendment. I think it's grossly unfair, not just to the travellers, but to all those vulnerable groups that we were setting out to protect. And I will just finish by saying, Minister, that the local authorities in this country have sadly and badly let down the travelling community. The Irish Traveller Movement in July revealed that nationally 30% of travellers currently in need of accommodation. Under eight local authorities, the targets were set well below the need that was identified in the five-year traveller accommodation programmes. And there's a history of this and we know it because there was huge publicity around it during the last Traveller Accommodation Programme Plan, where we saw a pattern of every local authority not drawing down the spending that was allocated to them for traveller accommodation needs. So we have to redress this and we have to ensure that travellers are not evicted, despite the awful conditions they live in, during this pandemic and during the crisis. I would argue that it isn't good enough just to extend this for the period of level five, that really you're not going to come out of level five and have no COVID. You've admitted this yourselves. I think I've heard on radio programmes and other interviews over the last week, the expression ebb and flow being used by many of the government ministers. So ebb and flow, not zero, not crushing, not breaking the virus, but actually ebb and flow. So this is the strategy of the government and if that's your strategy, then you need to ebb and flow some decency in the direction of the most vulnerable. And among them, I give a shout out for the Irish travelling community. They need to be protected too. swimming with the puddle he got éner shoot. curling with coffee. Let's do it. I'll talk to you actually to the Irish travelling meteorologist Anastasia there another week in 7 months. Thanks, go to that. Yeah. Thanks Yankees. Thank you. Thank you, guys. Thank you. Thank you want me to be at the decrease here. Goodabad. Thank you. Thank you. Go my good. Hello, people. We'll be there, folks and a bit of a better choice. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you very much much. Thank you very much. This is my journey.