Darragh O’Brien accused of acting like ‘petulant child’ in debate on extending eviction ban

Minister for Housing Darragh O’Brien was accused of behaving like a “petulant child” in the Dáil on Tuesday evening by Sinn Féin’s housing spokesman Eoin Ó Broin.

Mr Ó Broin had put forward a motion calling on the Government to extend the eviction ban, which is due to expire at the end of March, until the end of the year and to take emergency action during that time to tackle homelessness.

The Minister said no decision had been made on extending the eviction ban, while legal and policy advice will have to be “carefully considered”.

Mr O’Brien accused Mr Ó Broin of “entering a very dangerous phase of Kellyanne Conway-style alternative facts”.

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Mr Ó Broin had called on the Minister earlier this month to explain the discrepancy in new-home completion figures between those published by the Central Statistics Office (CSO) and those by Construction Information Services (CIS).

The CSO recently reported that 29,851 new homes were built in the Republic last year, while independent firm CIS argued that other official figures show the actual total was more than 6,000 lower at 23,751.

The CSO uses the number of homes connected by State company ESB Networks for electricity distribution for its calculations while CIS draws its conclusion from figures provided by the statutory body the National Building Control Office.

Mr O’Brien said that last week, “when it suited” Sinn Féin, the party called “official housing completion figures too high, and when it suits you this week, you’re calling the homelessness figures too low”.

“So you’re entering a very dangerous phase, deputy Ó Broin, of Kellyanne Conway-style alternative facts and that damages public debate and it damages informed opinion,” he said.

The Dublin Fingal TD said he was “deeply concerned” about Sinn Féin “directly undermining the work of the CSO”.

“Where does the rejection of CSO statistics stop? Next, deputy, you’ll be questioning whether Jack really is the most popular boy’s name in this country,” he said.

The Minister then left the chamber after making his statement.

[ Mary Lou McDonald says Government ‘gaslighting’ renters and calls for eviction ban to be extended ]

In response, Mr Ó Broin said the Minister’s behaviour, “while it’s true to form, kind of surprised me”.

“He came in like a petulant child, he showed no compassion, showed no comprehension of the stress and strain that hundreds, if not thousands of people around the country are under,” he said.

The Dublin Mid-West TD said that, rather than dealing with the matter at hand and the reasonable suggestions that Opposition parties had put forward, the Minister engaged in denial, deflection and wilful misrepresentation “of everybody of this side of the House to avoid dealing with issues”.

Mr Ó Broin said, as his party colleague Thomas Gould had pointed out, Mr O’Brien “scurried out” of the chamber and left junior Minister Malcolm Noonan “once again carrying the can”.

He said the only conclusion he could draw was that the Minister for Housing “does not care” and that if he did he would have stayed for the entire duration of the two-hour debate.

The Sinn Féin TD added that the eviction ban would have to be extended and the sooner the Government announced it, “the better”.

Social Democrats TD Cian O’Callaghan said it was not surprising but deeply disappointing that the Minister used most of his speaking time, “as he does on the occasions he does come in to housing debates”, to attack Opposition parties rather than to talk about solutions.

“Nothing new unfortunately there,” he said.

The Dublin Bay North TD said there were serious questions around housing completion figures and looking for answers was not an attack on the CSO.

People Before Profit TD Richard Boyd Barrett said it appeared to be a tactic of the Minister “to skip out of these debates and not listen to the Opposition” and that it was “insulting” to people caught up in the housing crisis.

Speaking earlier, Taoiseach Leo Varadkar said a decision on the eviction ban would be made by Government in the next two to three weeks.

“We will have to give a careful consideration. When we introduced it in November, we had hoped it would have the same effect that it had during the pandemic, that we would see the number of people in emergency accommodation go down, but that hasn’t happened,” Mr Varadkar said.

“We have to face up to the fact that it hasn’t had the desired effect and we’re still seeing people entering homelessness for lots of different reasons: family breakdown, losing their place in the private rental sector, other reasons too.

“It also has had some unintended consequences. We’ve probably all come across people coming home from abroad, coming back from Australia and Dubai and other places who can’t move back into their own house and their apartment and that’s an issue too, so we’ll have to weigh up the pros and cons of a further extension.”