Glacial progress to the urgent need for homes

THE media can be criticised for being Dublin centric and overly obsessed with the problems of the capital. But when focusing on a bigger picture, a single lens is best. If you want to appreciate why so many are tearing their hair out about the disconnect between what the Government says it is doing and what actually manifests in terms of concrete reality, then there is no better issue than housing – and no better place to start than the story of St Michael’s Estate in Inchicore.

At first there was relief that the Government was finally moving to provide quality affordable housing for low- and middle-income earners. The Inchicore site has it all: a prime site, close to the city centre, with good transport links, and State-owned land to boot – what could possibly go wrong? Here was a gilt-edged opportunity to deliver affordable homes. And every city council in the country is in dire need of homes to cater for all income groups.

With this in mind, it should be remembered that the State has identified roughly 700 publicly owned sites across the country, all with the potential to be developed for new homes.

Yet no sooner had Housing Minister Eoghan Murphy, in full self-congratulatory mode, announced his plan for a 470-unit development, then up stepped Health Promotion Minister and colleague Catherine Byrne to issue a statement saying the plan was “wide of the mark”. It was all “deeply disappointing”, she added. As this spat was playing out, Focus Ireland revealed that just under 10,000 people are homeless, among whom are 3,000 children.

This is a very real and human tragedy, to which we are at risk of being desensitised. Meanwhile, Mr Murphy breezily insists we are making “progress”. If we are, it is glacial and in no way reflective of the level of urgency required to deal with the hardship of homelessness.