Thomas Pringle TD
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Packed Venue at Homelessness Conference reveals public concern for problem in Donegal

Homelessness Conference Thomas speaking

 

Last night’s Conference on Homelessness in Donegal saw a packed venue at the Radisson Blu in Letterkenny where over 150 people attended to hear from contributors Thomas Pringle TD, Peter McVerry of McVerry Trust, David Hall of iCARE Housing and Declan Dunne of Respond! Housing. The event was organised by Housing Rights Awareness with Frankie Healy co-chairing the event for the evening as the problem of hidden homelessness in Donegal and the Government’s response was discussed in detail.

“It’s quite humbling to see how concerned people are about homelessness in Donegal. While official numbers don’t reach the thousands as they do in Dublin, people here feel that hidden homeless is reaching unacceptable levels and that something needs to be done before the problem gets worse. They’re aware that the Government’s priorities lie elsewhere which they feel is not good enough” says Deputy Pringle.

“Twice I introduced legislation to have the right to housing recognised in the Constitution and twice Fine Gael and Fianna Fáil voted it down. People deserve a Government that protects their interests over the interests of the private sector. Anything different is just plain dangerous” concludes Pringle.

At the conference Fr Peter McVerry spoke of the changing profile of those entering homelessness: “It used to be mainly people with drug and alcohol problems but now we’re seeing families and even people with jobs. The cause of the homelessness problem is we stopped building social housing. Over the next 10 years the Government will transfer €7.5 billion to private sector landlords and not one social house will be built” he concluded.

Declan Dunne of Respond! Housing summed up the issue of the Government’s funding of HAP saying “the main problem with HAP is the insecurity. We need to build social homes as the only solution. It’s about handing over keys to people.”

David Hall of iCARE Housing said plainly “There are 17,000 people before the courts at the moment in danger of losing their home and 32,000 people in arrears. We have a housing crisis but with thousands more close to losing their homes, this will turn crisis into a catastrophe”.

ENDS

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