Housing Minister Eoghan Murphy faces threat of no-confidence motion

Housing Minister Eoghan Murphy faces the threat of a motion of no confidence when the Dáil returns as the number of homeless people is set to rise again.

Mr Murphy conceded yesterday that the official figures, to be published later this week, are to increase from the 9,872 recorded in June, which included 3,824 children.

The Opposition was stinging in its criticism of the rookie minister, who they accused of being “out of touch” and seeking to normalise the housing crisis.

“They sat all night to save the banks, where is the urgency on this issue. When will Fine Gael start treating this as the crisis it is,” Labour’s housing spokeswoman Jan O’Sullivan said.

Sinn Féin spokesman Eoin Ó Broin has said the threat of a motion of no confidence in Mr Murphy “was never taken off the table” before the summer and will be considered when the party meets next week.

Fianna Fáil’s spokesman Darragh O’Brien said he and his leader would insist that October’s budget be a “housing budget” when negotiations begin next month.

Speaking to the Irish Examiner, he said: “Behind every figure are a family. The Government needs to stop treating this as business as usual.”

Mr Murphy, speaking on RTE Radio, said that a rise in one region leads him to believe that the latest homeless figures will rise.

My understanding is that they will be slightly up because we are, again, seeing an increase in presentations. My understanding is that the figures have gone up in one particular region which would give me reason to believe that actually they’ll be up overall,” he said.

“Whether or not they hit 10,000 this month, I can’t be certain now.

“Hitting 10,000 doesn’t tell us anything that hitting 9,000 didn’t tell us which is that we have a very serious crisis,” he said.

Mr Murphy defended his performance as minister.

He said that 2,400 social homes were built last year and he stressed that another 4,400 will be built this year.

He claimed he and the government will “hit our target for increasing the stock of social housing by 50,000 by 2021.”

Rejecting internal Fine Gael criticism of his performance as minister, Mr Murphy said he has become the focus of negative attention because policies are working.

The reason you are seeing the focus on me as a person is because the policies are working,” he said.

The Irish Examiner last week reported that some Fine Gael ministers fear their “posh boy” image and failure to solve the housing crisis will “kill” their election hopes.

“It doesn’t matter where I’m from or where I grew up or how I dress or how I look or how I speak, none of these things matter and people who, serious people really who shouldn’t entertain those types of ideas but, unfortunately, some of our politicians and some of our commentators are.

“What matters is: are our policies working. If people think the problem or our housing crisis is the fact that I am a posh boy from Dublin 4, then they are missing the mark completely.”