Over thirty people attended a forum on the housing crisis last Thursday
(15th October) in the Axis Centre Ballymun, hosted by Workers’ Party Dublin North West candidate Jimmy Dignam.
Speakers at the forum were Fr. Peter McVerry (Homelessness campaigner), Lorraine Hennessy (Housing Activist in Balgaddy) and Jimmy Dignam (Workers’ Party Candidate for Dublin North West).
Jimmy Dignam opened the meeting by stating that the crisis was caused by the state’s reliance on private developers to provide homes instead of building social housing. He slammed the lack of action on rent control and social housing by Fine Gael and Labour, but noted it was unsurprising when 41 TDs were private landlords.
Fr. Peter McVerry outlined the scale of the housing emergency, highlighting that 70 families were made homeless in Dublin this month, a number that is increasing every month. He predicted this emergency would worsen drastically over the cold winter months with homeless families being forced out of hotel rooms they are currently staying in.
Lorraine Hennessy spoke about the appalling conditions that social housing communities across the country have been left in and the role that both local and national authorities have played in their continued neglect.
An animated discussion then took place about what action could be taken to highlight the devastating impact of the housing emergency. It was agreed that local housing campaigns were needed, to inform the public of the nature of the crisis, and to put pressure on Fine Gael and Labour politicians to take serious action to deal with it.