Pandemic eviction moratorium 'prime example' of successful homelessness reduction

Pandemic eviction moratorium 'prime example' of successful homelessness reduction

The Simon Community will say that HAP rates need to be addressed to prevent people falling into homelessness. File photo: Eddie O'Hare

Runaway inflation is leading renters to make "unsustainable" top-ups to government housing supports, a housing charity will tell politicians.

The Oireachtas Housing Committee will meet on Tuesday to discuss the implementation of its interim report on homelessness, published last summer. 

That report contained 17 recommendations, including that private emergency accommodation be “quickly phased out” and replaced with appropriate long-term housing. 

In its opening statement, the Simon Community will tell TDs and Senators that the permanent form of this support for people experiencing homelessness now makes up 53% of all places, with temporary emergency places at around 1.85%.

The charity will say that while emergency accommodation is vital, the Government must do more to "stop homelessness from happening in the first instance". 

It will point to the Covid-19 moratorium on evictions as a "prime example of a homeless prevention measure that successfully reduced family homelessness in Ireland". 

However, representatives from Simon will say that rates of the Housing Assistance Payment (HAP) need to be addressed to prevent people falling into homelessness.

"The runaway inflation in the cost of housing has led to a situation in which individuals and families have little option but to “top-up” the HAP payment in order to secure a home. This is increasingly unsustainable and the HAP rates and discretion of local authorities have to be addressed as a matter of great urgency."

In its submission, the Mendicity Institution will say that of 96 service users it surveyed, 85 said that they would give their overall level of safety in hostels less than a three out of 10 and that 90 had been victims of crime. 

The group will add that changes need to be made to rules around social housing applications because current rules are trapping people in hostels.

"This is illustrated well by ‘Aidan’ who spent periods of time in foster care and residential care as a minor and was at times hospitalised. He has lived at some point or another in almost every county in Ireland. He is currently in Dublin, working, and in a tent. He has spent time in PEA, sharing a room with three others, but drug use and violence make him feel safer outside," it will say.

In her statement, Caroline Timmons, the Assistant Secretary at the Department of Housing, Local Government and Heritage, will say that the trend in 2021 "was an overall increase on 2020 (homelessness) figures".

The Dublin Regional Homelessness Executive (DRHE) will say that 4,923 households have been prevented from entering homelessness through the creation of alternative tenancies in the Dublin Region over the past three years.  The Homeless HAP has "proved to be the single biggest contributor in preventing homelessness during that period", it will add.

More in this section