Social Protection doesn’t protect the vulnerable

As I walked along the footpath of one of Cork city’s main streets recently, I came across an articulate young man sitting on the pavement; his back against the wall; asking passers-by for change. I gave him some.

He told me that he was in a ‘catch 22 situation’. The Department of Social Protection would not give him benefit as he has no permanent address. If he did not have a dwelling house, social protection would not pay him rent allowance for six months.

Who designed this system? At face value it appears to be meant to keep people on the streets, permanently.

Social protection is not protecting this man socially or in any other way. Their arrangements are protecting his social exclusion.

We are turfing our own people out of bed to make way for newcomers or are there beds for all?

Declan Gould

Blackrock

Cork City