Rory Hearne: The hidden housing crisis for people with disabilities

The potential of people with disabilities to contribute to society and fulfil their lives is being severely limited by societal exclusionary barriers

Mon, 22 Nov, 2021 - 10:00

Dr Rory Hearne

Ciara is a brave and articulate young woman. But she is homeless, and sleeping in her car. In 2019, her private rental accommodation was becoming unsuitable for her deteriorating health needs.

Then she was issued a notice to quit.

She couldn’t find any suitable private rental accommodation and her Housing Assistance Payment (HAP) was insufficient. So she was made homeless. She told her shocking story on my podcast, Reboot Republic, last week.

“I’ve lost everything. I’ve no support provision because I don’t have a home," Ciara said.

"As a result, I’m unable to access the appropriate services. So I don’t have the necessary care services in place to support my daily living and basic health care needs.

"Unfortunately, all my worst nightmares have come true. I need help, I live in pain every day."

If I don’t get social housing I see myself going into a nursing home as I cannot continue the way I am going.

Ciara’s story is not unique. It’s part of the hidden housing ‘crisis within a crisis’ for people with disabilities in Ireland.

The Irish Wheelchair Association describes the housing needs of people with a disability as being “the most invisible, hidden and unmet housing need within the Irish State”.

One in eight people in Ireland, 643,131 people, have a disability; people with disabilities struggle with housing issues on a daily basis.

Independent Living Movement Ireland (ILMI) and Inclusion Ireland recently launched the 'Our Housing Rights' campaign.

ILMI policy officer James Cawley says the issues include young disabled people living with aging carers, the lack of supports to live independently, impossible application processes, and waiting lists.

He also said: “If you are a person with a disability who works, and are over the financial threshold, you can’t get on the social housing list.”

You must seek private rented accommodation — [it's] like trying to find a needle in a haystack.

The state requires people with disabilities to navigate multiple layers of bureaucracy to prove their disability and entitlement to support.

A third of people with a disability are affected by housing deprivation and one in 10 cannot keep their homes adequately warm, double the rate of those without a disability.

More than 2,000 adults are still living in institutional congregated settings despite government commitments to more appropriate accommodation by 2017.

PJ Drudy, emeritus professor of economics at Trinity College and chairperson of St John of God Housing, which provides homes for adults with intellectual disabilities and mental health difficulties, highlights “the crisis of increasing number of adults with intellectual and physical disabilities still living with ageing or ill parents or unable to cope”.

He estimates 19,500 older adults in the moderate to profound intellectual disability category still live in the family home.

Lack of essential support care

The lack of essential support care, especially for those with intellectual disabilities is critical; the HSE provides limited, but insufficient, funding.

The lack of personal assistance and home support hours prevents people taking up social housing or even being offered it.

A catch-22 situation exists where people with disabilities cannot secure housing from local authorities in the absence of a sufficient support package.

The Disability Federation of Ireland points to Ireland’s ratification of the UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities, committing to “the equal right of all persons with disabilities to live in the community, with choices equal to others”, including, “in-home, residential and community support services” and “personal assistance necessary to support living and inclusion in the community”

Unfortunately, the reality for many people with a disability in Ireland is far from that commitment.

Dominika describes her parent’s home, where she lives, as dangerous and inaccessible, as she is a "fall risk, having seizures and fainting often”.

She explains: “I can't wash in a bathtub; I've almost drowned. I can't use the shower standing up; it's glass, and the bathroom is tiny."

I've fallen down the stairs. I've burnt myself because the appliances aren't accommodated to my disabilities.

"Downstairs doesn't work either as we don't have a bathroom there, and even if we wanted to build one, we don't have enough money and no place for one.”

There are 4,000 households where a member has an enduring physical, sensory, mental health, or intellectual impairment, who are eligible for social housing, but languish on housing waiting lists, often for years.

People with a disability have been severely affected by housing policy shifting from permanent social housing by local authorities to relying on the private rental sector through the HAP.

Discrimination on the grounds of disability and receipt of HAP is illegal under the Equal Status Acts yet people with a disability are twice as likely to report discrimination in the housing market.

They find it difficult to find a landlord that will accept them or source accessible housing.

People with a disability are twice as likely to report discrimination in the housing market.

HAP, as Ciara shows, is an insecure and inappropriate form of social housing, exposing disabled people to homelessness.

Census 2016 revealed a quarter of homeless people (1,871 people) had at least one disability, including 840 people with a chronic illness and 180 people with blindness or serious vision impairment.

A 2020 study into homelessness amongst people with intellectual disabilities and/or autism and their families in Dublin identified the lack of security of tenure in private rental, compounded by lack of supports, leading to a return to residential services.

Emergency accommodation is especially challenging for families with a child with an intellectual disability and/or autism.

Limited facilities lead to severe psychological difficulties in carers and behavioural and developmental regression in children.

Access to appropriate and secure housing and personal supports are key in assisting people with disabilities to lead independent lives, enabling participation in the community.

Housing adaptation grant inadequate

But the housing adaptation grant is inadequate and hasn’t increased in a decade. How are people with disabilities supposed to afford to retrofit their homes?

The potential of people with disabilities to contribute and fulfil their lives is being severely limited by societal exclusionary barriers.

Ireland’s at risk of poverty rate for disabled people is 23%. The rate in Denmark is half that.

Deprivation is not inevitable; it results from social policy and economic choices.

We need to create a rights-based society that dismantles systemic barriers. An important step would be holding the referendum to put the right to housing (which emphasises accessibility and non-discrimination) in our Constitution.

People with disabilities have aspirations, desires, and determination to pursue education, employment, live independently, fulfil life and career dreams, and to contribute to, and be part of, communities and wider society.

Irish society is poorer as a result of its denial of this huge potential and capacity of people with disabilities.

In a country with 180,000 vacant homes, enough public land to build 250,000 homes, and billions available to be invested by the state, there is something fundamentally broken when people with disabilities are left living through such housing crises.

In housing for people with disabilities, there is so much more the Government and Irish state could, and should, be doing.