Louth Council 'has not provided what was agreed', say evicted Travellers

A number of Travellers evicted from an illegal halting site in Dundalk yesterday say they have been left homeless.

Twenty-three families were moved from Woodland Park after Louth County Council cited health and safety concerns in the wake of the Carrickmines fire last year.

A number of families say they were told they had be given rented accommodation - but this is yet to be provided.

Louth County Council says it is in contact with letting agencies to source properties.

However, spokesperson for the families Rebecca Quinn said that it is not good enough.

"I was on the floor of my sister's last night," she said.

"You've had people bunching into caravans, letting the women and children into caravans and the men sleeping in the cars.

"Simply because the Council will not provide what they said they will do.

"When we got on to the solicitor yesterday, the solicitor got on to Louth County Council and said: 'Look, this is not what we agreed on Tuesday'.

"That's simply not good enough."

Update (3.48pm): Sinn Féin’s Louth TD Gerry Adams has expressed his deep concern today’s events.

“The decision to evict 15 Traveller families from a second site in Dundalk underlines the folly of the original decision of the County Council to evict them from the Woodland Park site last week,” he said.

“It is outrageous that families, many of them with small children, and who are already traumatised by being evicted last week, are being evicted again as a consequence of a bad decision by the council.

“Louth County Council has a legal obligation as a designated housing authority to accommodate homeless families. It is bizarre at a time of an unprecedented housing crisis in County Louth, where there are 5,000 people on the Council’s housing waiting list, that the Council has taken a course of action that has only made more citizens homeless. This is entirely inappropriate.

“There should be no more evictions. The families do not want conventional housing so the Council's refusal to refurbish the Woodland Park site using money allocated by the government is incomprehensible.

“The solution to this problem is for the Council to urgently draw down the money available from government and to upgrade the Woodland Park site. This is the most realistic and cost effective approach.”