Alan Kelly: Dublin council commentary on homelessness 'very hard to stomach'

The Minister for the Environment Alan Kelly has said it is hard to stomach political commentary on the homeless crisis from Dublin City Councillors.

Minister Kelly has criticised the council for cutting the property tax by 15%, and not allocating any of that money towards helping the homeless.

He said that his department cannot simply "wave a magic wand" and make the crisis go away, and said that they need more co-operation from councils.

Minister Kelly has said that Dublin councillors chose not to allocate more funding to tackle the issue.

“When councillors come and talk to me and start waging political commentary on the issue on homelessness it is very hard to stomach when they had a choice and decided to actually not maintain more funding for homelessness,” Minister Kelly said.

"This is a fact. Dublin City Councillors, not all of them, but a large proportion of them obviously, and the majority have decided not to allocate extra funding to homelessness.”