Homeless crisis leads to war of words in Dail

The Tánaiste Frances Fitzgerald has described as 'unacceptable' the fact that homeless families were referred to Garda stations and had to sleep in parks this week due to a lack of emergency beds.

Her comments came as the Government and Fianna Fáil united this lunchtime to vote down a bill put forward by Solidarity-People Before Profit calling for emergency legislation to tackle the homeless crisis.

Frances Fitzgerald said the Government was taking every initiative possible to deal with the housing crisis and this week wasn't reflective of a normal one.

The comments came after seven families failed to find emergency accommodation on Tuesday night, leading four to sleep in public parks.

In the Dail PBP TD, Eoin O'Broin, said the failure to deal with empty units was the government's biggest failure.

"There are 183,000 vacant homes across the state. 40,000 in Dublin. That's 24 vacant homes for every adult and child in emergency accommodation ... That is Enda Kenny's legacy.

Meanwhile, the housing minister has said a new national plan to deal with the country's vacant homes will be published "within days".

Simon Coveney said the strategy would make a "real impact" in the housing crisis.