The number of homeless people in the Dublin region has increased by 300, two years into a three-year Government strategy to tackle the crisis, figures being published tomorrow will show.
The figures from the Dublin Homeless Agency are contained in the three-year follow-up to the 1999 Counted In report which found 2,900 people were homeless in Dublin, Kildare and Wicklow. Of these 2,760 were found in the Dublin Corporation area.
The latest report, prepared for the Agency by the ESRI, will find that figure to have increased to 3,200. It is expected that over 85 per cent, or more than 2,700, people are homeless in the Dublin area.
The figure is a measure of people living in B&B accommodation and hostels as well as those sleeping rough during one week in March this year.
Mr Greg Maxwell, Director of the Dublin Simon Community, pointed out that the 1999 figures had represented a doubling of the homeless figures in the Dublin region between 1996 and 1999.
"The thing to bear in mind is that the Government agreed then it was a crisis. It is still a crisis."
That 1999 report led to the formulation of the Homelessness - An Integrated Strategy approach in 2000, to tackle homelessness across the State. It required the establishment of homelessness forums in each county, with local authorities and health boards contributing co-ordinated three-year action plans to provide more accommodation and settlement and outreach programmes. These would help homeless people back into independent living.
The 2002 figures for the Dublin area, said Mr Maxwell, showed the Dublin Strategy had "not made any progress" in addressing the issue.
"And one thing you can say is that figure of 3,100 is the 'at least' figure, because there will always be a number of people who didn't get counted," he said.
Mr Declan Jones, chief executive of Focus Ireland, said the Government was "not meeting its own targets on homlessness".
"Government choices are creating this problem," he said, adding that lack of resources being provided to those working in the sector was exacerbating the problem.
Mr Maxwell said the ultimate solution to the issue was access to housing, but if dwellings continued to be built at the current rate it would take Dublin's local authorities over 30 years to address just the current housing waiting list.
