John McGuinness

Overall sentiment: 0.04
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In the short time I have, I would like to raise a number of issues that have been raised here before, but I would like to see them addressed. In Kilkenny city over the weekend, a family - a husband and wife and two children, one of the children a special child - became homeless. They rang all of the telephone numbers to seek help and there was no answer. That is the basic failure of bureaucracy, of housing, of the Department, of anyone who should have been manning those phones, a failure to respond to the needs of that family. That is truly shocking when we consider the amount of money that is being poured into the local authorities to deliver on their housing programme. I asked previously about zoned land that is already serviced and has been dezoned. The developer wants to finish the site, conclude the development and provide 30 to 40 homes but he cannot do it. Is that not a failure of bureaucracy? On the tenant in situ scheme, I am aware of two families in Kilkenny city who qualify for the scheme but the council will not respond. I cannot understand. If there is funding there, and we are told there is, and a duty to fulfil the needs of both those families, why does the council drag its feet on the tenant in situ scheme? Finally, the number of houses throughout Carlow and Kilkenny that are vacant and waiting to be refurbished, they say, to be allocated is truly shocking. All of that may be at a very basic level but it is a fact and it is a failure of bureaucracy. If the Minister is putting that amount of money into a system that answers queries in the manner I have experienced, how in the name of God can he expect them to spend the billions he is giving to them?

Sentiment score: 0.04