The Dáil Public Accounts Committee (PAC) has heard that 159,000 people arrived in Ireland seeking temporary accommodation or international protection, between 2022 and last year.
This included 114,000 people who fled the war in Ukraine, Oonagh McPhillips, Secretary General of the Department of Justice said.
She said this placed "exceptional demands" on the State’s system and it had to respond to a "sudden and intense" surge in asylum applications.
From the end of 2023, the State was unable to provide all applicants with accommodation, Ms McPhillips said.
"While most applicants were not rough sleeping, the numbers of those awaiting an offer rose to a peak of 3,500 people in March of this year," she said.
Meanwhile, Ms McPhillips said in the year up to April, the CSO recorded that almost 125,300 people moved to Ireland. This includes 31,500 returning Irish citizens and 30,200 arrivals from the UK and EU.
Approximately 50% came from other countries such as India and Brazil to work or study.
'Enormously positive contributions'
Ms McPhillips stressed the "enormously positive contributions" these people have made to "our society and our economy".
The Comptroller and Auditor General told the Committee the Department spent €2.3 billion on its accommodation programme last year. Séamus McCarthy said €1.2 billion was spent on accommodation and other costs for Ukrainian beneficiaries of temporary accommodation. Meanwhile, €1.1bn was spent on accommodation for others seeking international protection.
He said over 90% comprised of payments to commercial providers. By the end of last year, nearly 3,000 international protection applicants were living in State-supported accommodation, Mr McCarthy said. Around three quarters of those applicants were in emergency accommodation.
Mr McCarthy also raised that an examination of sample IPAS properties found pre-contract due diligence records were "significantly incomplete". Evidence of planning permission to use the property for international protection accommodation was only available for one in five of them, he said.
Insurance certificates and fire certificates were only available for around two in five of these properties. Actual signed contracts were available for just half of the sample properties reviewed, Mr McCarthy said.
He said the examination also identified gaps in the controls over payments for accommodation. In December 2023, it was established that a provider of multiple properties had been overcharging VAT and had overpaid a total of €7.4 million. By September 2025, just €1.5m of this had been refunded.
Fianna Fáil TD Catherine Ardagh asked if the money has since been recovered and if the provider is still operating IPAS centres. In response, David Delaney, Head of International Protection and Integration said the situation relates to a time where there was a lack of clarity around the appropriate VAT for emergency accommodation.
He said the provider did a self-correction, and the money owed has been paid back. No further money is owed back to the Department, he said.
'Robust, due diligence' process
Ms Ardagh also asked how providers are chosen and what checks are now in place to ensure prices charged are "fair and reflect value for money for the Irish taxpayer". She asked how the Department justifies such large payments when proper contracts were not signed. In response, Mr Delaney said there is a "robust, due diligence" process.
When asked by Ms Ardagh, Mr Delaney said the current per night rate for contracted accommodation is around €71.
