‘Housing For All’ review needs to reduce homelessness, says Cork Simon

Policies to reduce the continuously increasing levels of homelessness must be at the heart of the review of the government’s Housing For All strategy, Cork Simon say.

The April figures show that 650 people were in emergency accommodation in Cork, the seventh record high in a row.

Paul Sheehan, Cork Simon’s head of campaigns and communications told The Echo they were seeing no signs that this trend was going to reverse any time soon.

“It’s alarming —looking at the figures, since October 2024 it’s been a record high every month. The figures were 562 that month, and they’ve just kept increasing, ing the 600 mark for the first time in January and they’re now well in the 600s.

“It’s absolutely unsustainable — the emergency shelter system across the city is full to capacity, with consistently more people being put in private emergency accommodation like hotels and BnBs.

“The issue, and there’s no question about it, is the housing crisis. People can’t afford to put a roof over their head and it’s pushing more and more people into homelessness,” Mr Sheehan said.

“Until we get a significant increase in the supply of housing, that’s not going to change.”

He said “a clear direction” from the government in of tackling homelessness was needed, a plan and timelines that showed they were treating the situation as an emergency. Currently the state are signed up to a policy of ending homelessness by 2030, and he said “I don’t think anybody thinks we’re going to do that.

“The government are adding layers upon layers of pressure onto households already under significant strain — the cost of living crisis isn’t as severe as it was two years ago, but housing costs are getting more severe.

“Then we see the government removing funding for the tenant in situ scheme, which was a huge success in preventing people being pushed into homelessness — we’re wondering what kind of policy they’re funding, because six months into this government it’s hard to point to any one measure they’ve introduced so far that will help.”

He said the news that the Housing For All policy is being reviewed, with publication “imminent”, is positive.

“We look forward to reading it, hopefully there’s some measures in there that will provide some chink of light, because I’ve never seen this steep of an increase in just a few months.”