'Not enough housing available' says Simon Community as homelessness figures rise

ireland
'Not Enough Housing Available' Says Simon Community As Homelessness Figures Rise
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Digital Desk staff

There has been an increase in the number of people accessing emergency accommodation.

The total number for July is now 8728, which is up by 29 from the previous month.

The figures include 6,077 adults and 2651 children, with a total of 1,100 families recorded as homeless.

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Back in June there were 8,699 individuals accessing emergency accommodation.

Sam McGuinness from the Dublin Simon Community says the numbers had been going down for several months:

"I think we are probably coming into winter already and the accommodation that we were hoping would be available like Airbnb. it must not be coming out.

"There is just not enough housing available for people to move into so it is not good and it is not what we were hoping.

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He said a lot work has been done in hunting down new accommodation but clearly it not is having the impact they hoped for.

Eviction ban

Speaking this afternoon Inner City Helping Homeless (ICHH) chief executive Anthony Flynn also said:

“It would be my opinion that the increase in homeless figures is a direct result of the lifting of the eviction ban.

"This was pre-warned, the Minister simply did not listen. There is no victory to claim regarding the housing & homeless crisis, in fact the council and department are setting up for a major societal own goal.

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"Moving people off the list on twelve month licence agreements in order to see a quick and fast reduction in overall figures is disingenuous to say the least and Minister O’ Brien is complicit in this.

Mr Flynn said the outlook for the next few months does not long good either:

"We are to set to see a tsunami coming at us hard and quick and we will not be prepared. Numbers in relation to rough sleepers are not factored in and we have seen a 50 per cent increase in this number.

"With 164 people sleeping rough on one night last week. Figures also do not include domestic violence shelters, direct provision centres or couch surfers and are completely disingenuous overall," he said.

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