The homeless services are meeting a growing number of immigrants from the new EU states who have come here badly prepared and with little money and have ended up on the streets, a new report has found.
According to the Away from Home and Homeless report from the Homeless Agency, between 60 and 120 people from the new EU states were seeking support from homeless services in Dublin on any given day last September.
The report's authors, consultants Tanya Lalor and Emmet Bergin, interviewed 49 of these people in food centres and found that the majority were single Polish men in their mid-30s.
One-third of them were sleeping rough, mainly in places such as Phoenix Park, in railway stations and on the streets of Dublin. Some 15 per cent were staying with friends or relatives while 6 per cent were in squats.
Many had been here for less than four months. Their level of preparation before coming was "very poor" and they had depended mostly on word of mouth.
Ms Lalor said they had a sense that they would come here and find a job and accommodation very quickly "and it would all be pretty much plain sailing".
Only one-quarter had secured a job here before leaving Poland while 64 per cent did not have accommodation arrangements in place before leaving home.
Some 78 per cent brought less than €500 with them - the average monthly wage in Poland. Of these, almost one-third came with less than €200. More than one in three of those surveyed had child dependants in Poland.
Ms Lalor said they did not fit the typical profile of homeless people, as 82 per cent of them had no previous experience of homelessness, and they had a very good standard of education.
There was clear evidence also of exploitation and false promises received from employers and job agencies. Some 38 per cent who gave details of wage rates had been earning less than the minimum wage. One person reported paying €1,000 to an agency in Poland before travelling here only to find that he had no job.
Mr Bergin said that the quickest way to address this specific problem of homelessness was to repeal the habitual residence condition - a Government restriction on access to some forms of social welfare for migrant workers. He said that no single Government department had responsibility for the overall welfare of this group of workers and called for a change in this.
Among its 24 recommendations, the report urges that accommodation and supplementary welfare allowances be provided on a short-term basis to immigrants who experience hardship during their first months here.
One man's story
The day before "Tomas" was interviewed in this report, he had walked from the city-centre to Dublin airport for a job interview and back again.
Four months after arriving here, he had no income and was sleeping rough, eating in the food centres for homeless people around the city.
Tomas (43) came from Poland to find work last May after meeting an Irish private sector employment agency in Poland and paying them €140 for what he believed was a job.
He left his wife and child in Poland and planned to work here for at least three years. Tomas brought between €1,000 and €2,000, but this money was spent within three weeks of his arrival, partly due to the expense of doing the Safe Pass course which would allow him to work on a building site.
His documents, including his passport, driving licence and bank cards, had been stolen shortly after coming here. He was finding the separation from his family very stressful and said that, because he had borrowed money to come to Ireland, he did not want to return until he could repay it.
