Michael Clifford: Tents are symptom of hands-off State

Dublin City Council chief executive Owen Keegan suggested ‘well-intended’ homeless volunteers are sustaining people sleeping in tents on the streets of the capital. File picture: Leah Farrell/RollingNews.ie

ONE of the most disturbing sights in the State’s cities in recent years has been the proliferation of tents, where people without homes are sleeping.

These tents are pitched on the street and in various locations around the cities, including parks, the suburbs, and in commercial hubs.

In the brutal environment of street living, the tent is a step up from a doorway, providing at least meagre protection from the elements for those who are known as rough sleepers.

The proliferation of tents has been a potent symbol of the housing and homeless crisis. Most of the acute misery thrown up by the crisis takes place behind closed doors, particularly in emergency accommodation.

Up and down the country, people are living half lives in hotel rooms and other emergency housing hubs. Their potential is stymied, with basic comforts largely unattainable. The vast majority are victims of a rental market that has gone through the roof.

Among those at the frontline is a large cohort of children whose development is being seriously compromised.

For the greater part however, that element of the housing and homeless crisis remains hidden from public view.

Full public glare

In contrast, the cohort who don’t even have steady emergency housing are living out their existence on the street in full public glare. These are the people who pitch tents for the night. Many among them have mental health or addiction problems and lead chaotic lives.

The public nature of this development has irked some and elicited strains of compassion in others.

Tents on the street are bad for a city’s image. Many retailers believe they impact negatively on the capacity to do business and more see them as a magnet for anti-social behaviour.

Then there are those, both individuals and ad-hoc groups, who have been moved by the housing and homeless crisis to supply tents to rough sleepers to lighten their load.

The issue of tents for the homeless was back on the agenda this week when Dublin city manager Owen Keegan told Newstalk’s Kieran Cuddihy that they were blighting the streets of the capital.

“There’s a whole industry out there about sustaining what we believe is a very unsafe and inferior form of accommodation for homeless people,” he said. 

“There is a whole lot of well-intended groups providing and delivering services on the street, when our view is that people are better off accessing services in a controlled environment where there is a full range of professional services.”

His is not an isolated view. A couple of years back, a controversy blew up in Cork about the siting of up to half a dozen tents on St Patrick’s Quay in the city centre. There were reports of anti-social behaviour in the area and Fine Gael councillor Des Cahill said the makeshift encampment presented a “poor image of the city”. 

Classified as litter

He called for the tents to be classified as litter and torn down.

“This isn’t a housing issue and they need to be taken down immediately,” he said. They were soon after.

The comments from both the council executive and the county councillor infer that the tents are surplus to the requirements for anybody without a home.

Mr Keegan explicitly stated there was no shortage of emergency beds in his city.

The obvious conclusion from the comments is that some people are camping out as a lifestyle choice, making a nuisance of themselves and facilitating anti-social behaviour.

The reality begs to differ. The vast majority of those sleeping out do so because of fear or bad experiences in emergency hostels. The “controlled environment” and “professional services” mentioned by Mr Keegan are not available.

Individuals who sleep on the streets have spoken in the media about waking up in a hostel and finding the man in the next bed shooting up heroin. File picture: RollingNews.ie

Hostels run by non-government agencies attempt to provide health and welfare services for clients. Those operated in the private sector supply little more than a security guard or two. Privacy of even the most basic standard is all but absent.

Individuals who sleep on the streets have spoken in the media about waking up in a hostel and finding the man in the next bed shooting up heroin. Or worse, waking up and finding all their worldly possessions have been stolen.

No inspectorate for hostels

There is no inspectorate for hostels. Sinn Féin’s Eoin Ó Broin published a bill on Thursday proposing that the Health Information and Quality Authority be given the power to inspect emergency accommodation. Why that hasn’t been done before now is anybody’s guess.

Volunteers working with homeless people don’t require Garda vetting. Individuals who are leading obviously chaotic lives, many of whom have obvious mental health frailties, are not categorised as vulnerable under vetting legislation.

This regime exists largely because the State has contracted out the care and accommodation of citizens unable to look after themselves. Just as with the building of public housing over the past three decades, the State has also retreated from direct responsibility for catering for homeless individuals.

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As for the recent history of other aspects of housing, some in the private sector maintain standards and others don’t because there is quite literally nobody checking how they go about their business. When such an approach is adopted in caring for people living chaotic lives, it should be no surprise that many opt to take their chances on the street instead.

One of the groups that stepped into the vacuum left by the State in caring for rough sleepers was Inner City Helping Homeless. The Dublin-based charity was founded by Anthony Flynn in 2014 — the sight of so many sleeping on the streets moved him to do something. 

The charity quickly expanded to the point where it had up to 200 volunteers, was operating seven nights a week, and had attracted major donations.

Passionate advocate

Councillor Anthony Flynn, founder of Inner City Helping Homeless, was considered a passionate advocate for homeless people. File picture

Mr Flynn was considered a passionate advocate for homeless people and was elected to Dublin City Council in 2019. 

A week ago he was suspended by the organisation he had built up due to allegations of sexual impropriety emanating from two individuals. On Wednesday, he died by apparent suicide.

His full legacy is unwritten and will remain so until such time as any allegations are properly examined and determinations made on them.

What the tragedy does once more highlight is that, in the vacuum left by the State, in the community and voluntary sector there will always be people with good intensions.

Sometimes, those people may not be best suited for taking on the task, notwithstanding their motivation. However, that’s what happens when State agencies — with all their structures, standards and rules — adopt a hands-off role in performing a basic societal function.