Cork Penny Dinners' Caitríona Twomey blasts Government's homelessness failure

Caitríona Twomey says she is angry that successive governments have failed to 'pull out all the stops' to end homelessness in Ireland

Caitríona Twomey of Penny Dinners warned the numbers seeking their assistance in Cork are 'increasing dramatically'. Picture: Denis Minihane.

The head of a soup kitchen in Cork who is currently in Poland handing out aid to refugees from Ukraine has said she is angry that successive governments have failed to “pull out all the stops” to end homelessness in Ireland.

Caitríona Twomey of Cork Penny Dinners said we should be in a better position to help people displaced through war and conflicts.

She warned the numbers seeking their assistance in Cork are “increasing dramatically”. 

"Our country should be fully operational and fully functional. It is not. And again I say this all the time ‘this is the job of Government'. This is what they are paid for. We should have no homeless in Ireland. Anyone that is homeless and has issues going on — we need treatment centres, we need hospitals, mental health …everything.

"It has gone on much much too long. The time for it has come for it to stop. I am very angry. If the Government had been pulling out all the stops for our own country all along our country wouldn’t be in the position it is today. 

"And nobody would be worried about who we are helping or feeling hard done by. We are pulling out all the stops. Stops should be pulled out for everyone," Ms Twomey told the Opinion Line on Cork’s 96FM.

Ms Twomey said she and the other volunteers are seeing people they know and grew up with who are coming to them for help at the soup kitchen in Cork city centre.

"They don’t want to be in that position at all. They have no other choice because they have no money for food to put on the table when they have paid most of their bills. I won’t say all of their bills because there is not that many people who can pay all of their bills on time. People are taking from Peter to pay Paul.” 

Meanwhile, Ms Twomey and other volunteers are on their second humanitarian mission to Poland since the war broke out in Ukraine.

She said volunteers who weren’t on the previous trip have been “cut straight in to their heart” when they encounter Ukrainian children, grandparents and mothers in the train stations.

She added the reality is that her organisation is trying to help not only the hungry and homeless in Ireland but refugees from Ukraine.

“We have the makings of a field hospital here but we need it back home as well. We need it everywhere. We help everyone. We have people from Afghanistan and Romania in Cork who need our help. We also have volunteers from all over the world in Penny Dinners.

"Anything that anyone can give to us we are grateful. We are planning to come back [to Poland] with more aid. This isn’t easy. The horror out here. They [the refugees] are heading in to the unknown and are afraid.” 

Penny Dinners operates a daily food service for the needy in Cork city. For information on how to donate to the soup kitchen go to www.Corkpennydinners.ie.