THE GOVERNMENT needs to act urgently if its commitment to eradicating long-term homelessness by the end of next year is to be realised, homeless charity Focus Ireland has stressed.
The charity said that, despite plenty of good intentions, political promises to deliver homes to the 5,000 people who were homeless in Ireland at any given time were not materialising.
Focus Ireland chief executive Joyce Loughnan said “the delivery of homes is not happening”, and that the most marginalised people in Irish society continued to suffer.
Last year the charity proposed a financing and leasing scheme which would have used empty accommodation in urban areas to house suitable applicants.
“Here we are, a year later, and the Government has launched leasing schemes with the intention of housing 300 people who are homeless and another 2,000 who are coming off the housing list, which at the moment has 56,000 people on it,” Ms Loughnan said.
“To our knowledge neither of those schemes have yet delivered one home. Unless there is urgent action and the political will to make ending homelessness a priority we won’t meet the Government’s target of ending long-term homelessness by 2010.”
The Government made its commitment to eliminate the long-term occupancy of emergency homeless accommodation by 2010 in the most recent social partnership agreement, Towards 2016.
The Department of the Environment said it was making every effort to achieve the targets in the Government strategy. However, it said achievement of the goal would ultimately depend on the effectiveness of local authorities and the voluntary sector.
At the publication of its 2008 report, Focus Ireland said it had worked with over 5,500 people last year and raised €5.7 million from donations, corporate support and its fundraising, some €500,000 less than in 2007.
The charity said it expected the number of people accessing its services this year to rise, and cautioned that cuts to social welfare, as proposed in the McCarthy report, could cause more people to struggle.
Ms Loughnan said the charity had lobbied the Government and the Opposition about the inclusion of a housing agency in the Nama legislation and that the feedback was positive. “It is absolutely inconceivable that the Government would dedicate €60 billion of taxpayers’ money to an organisation that then didn’t deliver a social return. It’s not just for schools and childcare centres, but it should be taking advantage of those empty homes we have been speaking about and land that can be developed for future social services.”
