No 'political will' to tackle growing homelessness problem, says charity

There appeared to be "no political will at all" to address the growing problems in Dublin of homelessness, rough sleeping and drugs, said Tony Geoghegan, chief executive of the largest charity working in these areas.

Mr Geoghegan, speaking in advance of the publication of Merchant Quay Ireland’s annual report today, said he “just cannot understand how people in power seem to be okay with people sleeping rough, with families and children becoming homeless and with the fact that at the end of a drug-rehabilitation process there is no accommodation available for people”.

“I don’t believe there is any political will at all to solve these crises. It can’t be rocket science and yet nothing is happening, while things are getting worse. Demand right across our services has increased. Increasingly I can’t understand it.”

He said the growing number of families with children in homelessness services was “building up a time-bomb”.

“I would be very worried about the long-term consequences for those children and the problems down the line we could be storing up there.”

‘Living on the edge’

The report shows that more than 8,000 individuals used Merchant’s Quay Ireland’s homelessness support services last year, the majority (over 7,000) of them in Dublin.

These could be homeless people and also individuals “living on the edge of homelessness”, said Mr Geoghegan.

More than 85,000 meals were served to homeless and people at risk of homelessness at its Dublin premises last year, across its day and evening services. “The real physical cost of being homeless is most starkly evidenced in the numbers of people accessing our primary healthcare services, where in 2013 we saw 1,523 individuals making nearly 4,500 visits to our nursing and GP clinics, which is more than a 30 per cent increase on the previous year,” says the report.

There were over 25,000 visits to the needle exchange – a 12 per cent rise. Some 3,260 individuals accessed the crisis drug services, with 614 of them being first-time presenters – a 23 per cent increase.

The GP service dealt with 1,487 consultations – a 78 per cent increase, with 785 individual patients.

Mr Geoghegan said services were struggling to meet new demands. In the past month the staff at the MQI breakfast service moved to open an adjoining room from 7am to 11am to allow people who had been sleeping rough to bed-down indoors.

‘Falling asleep’

“We noticed people were coming for breakfast and falling asleep in chairs. People just don’t get restful sleep when they’re sleeping rough. You can’t. You’re so vulnerable you can’t sleep soundly. So we decided to open the training room for the time between breakfast and lunch, for sleeping.”

It has a capacity for 20 and is full every day.

He also said there was nowhere for homeless families in hotels and B&Bs to bring children for nutritious cheap meals. A meal service should be opened specifically for families with children, he added.