Good luck long overdue for family

PATRICK CAULEY and his wife Julie are long overdue a run of good luck.

The couple, both of whom suffered physical and sexual abuse while in institutional care, fled from their home and now live in a caravan on the side of the road with their five children.

They have no running water, no toilet facilities or electricity. The family say they were forced out of their two-bedroom council house in Limerick city last June by drug users, joyriders and thugs who exposed themselves to their daughters and turned on them when they complained about the noise and the disruption.

They have put their names on two housing lists in Tipperary but have been living in the caravan at Cappawhite, Co Tipperary, ever since.

“We were living in Southill for five years but we had to get out of it,” Patrick, a native of Limerick, said.

“I’d be looking at my children through prison bars now if we stayed there. Drug users were dropping needles around my shed and the kids were picking them up.

“There were young fellas of 10 and 11 racing up and down the road in stolen cars and fellas exposing themselves to our daughters while they urinated against our shed. When I went out and protested about what was happening, the neighbours ganged up on us and we had to leave,” the 32-year-old said.

Patrick and Julia are both on disability payments, Patrick told Joe Duffy’s Liveline programme on RTÉ radio yesterday.

The couple can’t afford to run a car and have been off the road for three months now. Their children haven’t been in school since they moved because the local primary school is four miles away and they are not on a recognised school bus route.

However, after the intervention of local representatives and Department of Education staff, the five Cauley children will be picked up by a school bus from tomorrow morning and brought daily to Cappawhite National School. Martin 13, Patrick, 11, Michael, 10, Julie, 8 and Donna, 6 are thrilled to be going back to school. But with no running water or toilet facilities on the site, the big clean-up ahead of their first day will be tough.

“I am used to living in a caravan but the wife and the children aren’t,” said Patrick. “It’s awful tough on them. I went out and bought the caravan myself when we couldn’t take any more of Limerick. But that went on fire three months before Christmas. The council then gave us another caravan.

“All we want is a little place we can call home. A little place in the country would be lovely. I don’t really want the children going into a big estate. We’ve our name down on the corporation list in Tipperary town and Clonmel since last June. I really do think we’re now due a bit of luck.”

Visiting teacher Carmel O’Connor said the Cauley family are genuinely in need of a permanent place to live.

“I was appalled to see them washing themselves in a basin. They were promised emergency accommodation three weeks ago but nothing has been done. It’s a disgrace,” Ms O’Connor said.

Housing officer with Tipperary South Riding County Council Michael Fitzgerald was not available for comment on the matter yesterday evening.