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THE HOUSING MINISTER has promised that the government will pull “every lever available” to provide housing for refugees who come to Ireland from Ukraine.
However, Taoiseach Micheál Martin has previously said it will be challenging to secure the necessary amount of accommodation.
Local authorities’ records of vacant buildings are being examined to identify spaces that could be converted to multi-unit housing.
Minister for Housing Darragh O’Brien said that the 21,000-plus refugees who have arrived from Ukraine so far have been housed through the initial emergency response that’s being coordinated by the Department of Children and the Red Cross.
Speaking to RTÉ Radio One’s Morning Ireland, O’Brien said that around 500 refugees are arriving in Ireland on average per day.
“In the short term, we’ve already done a trawl through the 31 local authorities of significant vacant buildings. I’m not talking about individual houses, I’m talking about old commons, it could be hospitals, it could be that type of thing,” O’Brien said.
“We’ve worked through that list, there were over 500 supplied initially. The work will conclude on that this week, as to identifying which ones are easily convertible in the short term and which are longer term,” he said.
“We got the initial list from the local authorities just over two weeks ago. I’ve had three retired chief executives from local government working through those lists to see how quickly and categorise them into the ones that can be converted quickly.
There are emergency provisions under procurement that we can follow, which I intend to do, to fast track procurement. We can’t follow the normal public procurement procedures here. We need to look at approved lists and just get the work done.
“With some, it will indeed take months and then we’ve got to look at additional homes. I’ve also sought from local authorities to identify land both public and private that is not already identified for social and affordable housing.”
Asked about whether student accommodation buildings could be used, the minister said that would be difficult given the existing shortfall in student housing in Ireland.
“We have an issue in student accommodation already in providing affordable accommodation for our students… We have a situation now where student accommodation itself is very, very scarce.”
Beyond temporary housing, he said the “next phase” will be to look at finding permanent homes “because for many of the people who’ve arrived from Ukraine, unfortunately for them, their homes have been destroyed”.
Director of the Irish Homebuilders’ Association James Benson said that the use of existing housing stock, vacant units, and acting on uncommenced planning permissions should all be employed.
“It could be the case that you could have a single house that will need a change of use to bring it into a multi-unit dwelling that will provide refuge,” Benson said.
“You could also have unused commercial businesses, old banks that have been shut down or Garda stations that if they have a change of use through planning, they can be brought on stream,” he said.
“I think all listeners would identify within their own urban centres, suburban centres, towns, villages, right across the country, vacant and unused buildings.
He said there needs to be in-depth analysis of vacant buildings to identify the level of work required, but that the existence of infrastructure already in place would reduce the amount of time needed to make the spaces liveable.
“I think if you talk to home builders on a normal given day, the biggest impediment to delivery is infrastructure – our roads, our power supply, our water,” Benson said.
“The advantage of identifying and targeting those vacant and existing stock is all of those are currently in place, so you have the water connection, you have the power supply, and the road infrastructure is there, and that’s all critically important.
“That could reduce the delivery time significantly.”
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Sound great making a huge effort .. hopefully they’ll do the same for the 10k irish when there finished
@John Kavanagh: No they won’t. Paddy Irishman has to look out for himself. This move to help house war refugees is indeed the right thing to do. But, the same effort should be made our own homeless as well. By the way…..doesn’t that picture of the minister look a bit like Johnny Vegas? Perhaps they are the same person. Let’s face it….Have you ever seen them together?
Why haven’t they pulled every leaver available prior to the war in Ukraine? I’ll tell you why, they didn’t actually care, but now they need to have the appearance of good boys and girls in Europe, so now they’re bothered.
@Kárl: well there both comedians that’s for sure .. people laugh at them both for sure .. just for different reasons
@John Kavanagh: absolutely right john a pity they dont care about them ..pulling out all the stops for everyone else not the poor street people here…should be people here first but they want to look good in EU..muppets everyone of them …
@Kárl: They are looking after the job’s in EU they’ll get after being kicked out of this country . Must think it’ll look better on the old CV than ran a country into the ground and got paid for doing it.
@Kárl: also looks like billy the fish from Viz
@FiannaFáilness FineGaelness: Also I’m pretty sure that it’s lever not leaver The Journal
@Elizabeth Eccles: okay, let’s tell all the Ukrainians to wait a few years in their ruined cities while we sort ourselves out first, do people in these comments actually hear themselves? Stand in front of a Ukrainian family in need and an Irish family in need and try tell the Ukrainian family they deserve to wait as they didn’t have the privilege of being born in a country that wasn’t violently ravaged by a dictatorship. Its easy to type words but apparently even easier to forget these refugees are also just as human as us Irish.
@UserMcUserFace: I agree with your sentiments, I really do, however, the housing crisis in Ireland has been going on for a decade now while our government have done nothing substantial nor prioritised this. I don’t know why they have ignored our own homelessness crisis but by doing so it will hinder our chances to give a proper cead mile failte to the tens of thousands of Ukrainian refugees that we all want to help.
@Ashling Fenton: You’re very right, I should have copped that myself. C’est la vie!
Every leaver available? Were these leavers not available for the 7000 homeless that we already had and were entirely forgotten?
@Valentine Kane: ah sure housing our own wouldn’t have gotten us a pat on the head from the EU for being good little peons.
@Valentine Kane: There is already a huge effort to house homeless. We literally live in one of the most equitable societies on earth, spend an enormous amount of our budget on social services, housing, unemployment benefit, children’s allowance etc. Now, I’m way too old not to spot feigned indignation but I also know social media posts get taken out of context. 99.9% of people who troll about homeless people do nothing. If everyone who posted a pious sanctimonious post about homelessness took in a homeless person, there would literally be no homelessness.
But the reality is the “what about our own” brigade are tacit, and sometimes overt racists and xenophobes.
@Stephen Kearon: brilliantly stated, Stephen.
@Stephen Kearon: Well said. Also, no mention of that fact that it’s ‘our own’ who have decided to make their holiday homes and vacant properties available to the Ukrainians but chose not to do the same for ‘our own’ over the past 10 years.
The housing crisis here is equal parts political failure, planning failure and social indifference. All of it was caused in full by Irish society (political, financial and social) yet the far right are using their usual insidious means to pin the blame on foreigners and the usual old sheep are lapping it up and bleating it from the rooftops.
@Stephen Kearon: putting people in hotels, b&bs, homeless hubs isn’t housing them. And if it’s considered good enough of Irish people why now is it not good enough for Ukrainian people? It shouldn’t be up to the individual Irish person to house Irish families because our government failed to do so.
@Lee King Buckett: Total nonsense. There is no social indifference to blame for the lack of affordable & social housing in Ireland. Its bad governance. Now we have the state using taxpayers money to retrofit vacant properties at a no doubt enormous cost to permanently house an unknown no of foreign nationals when an entire generation of our young are locked out of the property market. And there’s nothing ‘far righr’ about pushing back against this as some social justice worries would say. Call you a racist or some sort of phobe for wanting our government to look after our own.
@Bricesypherthron Smith: By all means help within our means Again, where has all this generosity been for our 10,000 homeless stuck in hotels an generation rent working to live? Where were all these levers the past 15 years. A huge slap in the face is what it is. They’ll have to wait decades for whatever half backed ‘scheme’ FFG come up with to deliver ‘affordable’ housing at €400,000 for a 3 bed semi if they’re lucky
@Bricesypherthron Smith: Zzzzz.
@Philip Dwyer: You sound tired there Philip. Go back to sleep.
@Bricesypherthron Smith: No social indifference, really? Over 2,000 houses offered up by Irish people for Ukraine refugees but none of those were offered up to ease the domestic situation over the past few years.
Explain.
@Lee King Buckett: Because this is a temporary band aid short term solution Lee. Like the housing of homeless in hotels. Its irrelevant really. Good on those folks for allowing fleeing Ukrainians to take temporary refuge in these houses. Again, its not up to the public to solve the housing crisis. We pay highly paid elected officials for that and 50% tax. But they won’t be in these holiday homes long term. The issue is the state retrofitting vacant houses and fast tracking new builds to permanently house an unknown no of people. The same government that haven’t been able to fast track affordable & social housing for our homeless and working poor stuck in an exorbitant rental market. The issue here is our Government doing diddly squat to solve this problem for 20 years
@Valentine Kane: in fairness most of the homeless here need need help with their mental health it’s not a home they need, it’s the working and middle class being priced out of everything that’s the real problem.
@Stephen Kearon: your way to old to believe people would fall for your pseudo intellectual bull that your attempting here..There’s almost ten thousand of our own homeless ,your attack on these people through a feeble attempt at shaming those who speak for them ,says alot about you ,You pompous little Prat stevo aka the “bucket”….
@Philip Dwyer: your not being polite
Why have they not done this for the homeless in Ireland already?
@Derek Anderson: EU wouldn’t give them a little pat on back and say good job.
@Derek Anderson: do they want to go live in a tent in gormanstown or a convention centre?
Are Irish homeless willing to take a holiday house in the west of Ireland?
@Reg: That’s a private individual giving up a second home, nothing to do with the government.
@Richard Griffin: Reg knows that, he’s just having a dig at the Irish homeless. Usual from Reg.
Amazing to think that people are years on waiting lists for housing, people being thrown out of homes with unaffordable rents. Homeless people on the streets, people not able to get on the property ladder and when they do, a lifetime of massive mortgage repayments. But in Cork they pulled 1500 houses from out of nowhere, nationwide housing 900 a day from Ukraine. Bless them and all that, but our government couldn’t give a damn about us.
@Jason O Flynn: never a truer statement…cash cows for the rich is all we are.
@Jason O Flynn: do you fancy going to live in a tent in gormanstown military base? Or try out the convention centre? Maybe move your family into one of the commercial factories that could be converted? Try out a hotel used to home the refugees? No? Stop whining, when you arrive in a foreign country with a suitcase of belongings and f all else maybe then your opinion would change. Stop the poor me what can the state do for me attitude. Maybe then your outlook and life choices might veer in a better direction.
@Richard Griffin: I think you totally missed the whole point there Richie. Maybe read the whole comment before you spit out your tea on your tracksuit and slippers.
@Jason O Flynn: I did but all I’m reading is nonsense, not thought out, regurgitation what have the state done for me… Years on the waiting list, don’t depend on a free house or help work twice as hard to get what you deserve. Homeless, there are more than enough beds to get people off the streets. Granted it’s not up to the level of decency it should be but there are beds there. You have an issue with paying rent or having massive debt on a mortgage, pick an option both suck. If you don’t think we should offer sanctuary to women and children fleeing from a warzone while the men stay to defend there country and elderly who refuse to leave then I’d hate to live in your world.
If I identify as a Ukrainian can I get these benefits too ?
@ChadChaderson: of course, Chad. Just as soon as you head off to the front line…
More used to pulling strokes than levers.
And close all other avenues for Irish Citizens.
I live adjacent to a village/small town in SE Ireland, with a population of approx 800 people. There are at least 8 houses vacant in the centre of the village , some of them vacant since I moved to the area 35 years ago! It’s a lovely vibrant village, with lots going on and good transport links to the nearest town.
There is no need to have people without housing.
@Mary Walshe: Carlow – nah.
@Mary Walshe: money in that! For out corrupt govt!
Why arnt they pulling out all stops equally to include every single person that is homeless on the island of Ireland
@Pj Browne: we are
@Richard Griffin:
Heard him in Newstalk this morning. No limits on the numbers we’ll take in apparently. Don’t know how we’re going to support an unknown number bof people
Must be some kickback
Wondering can he not pull the same lever for Irish people as well??
Gas man entirely!
There can be no limit on how many we let in.
@John Moloney: well there has to be. We can’t handle an unlimited amount.
@Mark Dit: have a heart.
@John Moloney: Could/should we take in all 40 million Ukrainians, that’s 8 times the population of Ireland? That would be a catastrophe for everyone. Of course some limits are necessary.
@Alan Wright: Of course we can and then be made feel even more guilty about C02 emissions afterwards.
The comment section here gets more like Twitter/Facebook/Telegram daily.
Also, there appears to be some kind of mathematical correlation between the use of the phrase ‘our own’ and poor spelling/grammar.
@Lee King Buckett: Ah but doesn’t it give you that warm feeling of superiority Mr Bouquet.
@Lee King Buckett: is it raining up there on your high horse?
@G Row.: Not particularly but it is useful to point out the link between poor education and bigotry.
@Roy Dowling: You’re probably drier in your cave Roy but on the flip side, your knuckles will be sorer from dragging along the ground.
Swings and roundabouts I guess eh?
@Lee King Buckett: You would see a lot more bigotry from the educated in my opinion.
@Lee King Buckett: no I’m wet in the real world. Not the fantasy world online that you believe so much in. I’m all for helping others but kicking your own people when there down is absolutely unforgivable.
@Lee King Buckett: Silly reactionary comment; you comment on nearly all the articles and give off a hue of grandeur on knowing everything about everything, but sure twitter ( echo chamber) is your home, I don’t like FFG!? But defend their incompetence with childish utterances about grammar and other emotive guano. Angry bird today? Sling you hook…
@Epgenetics29 Declan Christoph: That’s just another facet of the kind of stuff that’s rife in the comments section here. Facts are facts, just because they don’t accord with your worldview doesn’t mean that they are supportive of a rubbish government.
@Lee King Buckett: Ahh the condescending j€rk0ff know it all with the leaky bucket strikes yet again! Stick a plug in it and give us all a rest will ya… There’s some amount of pure manure leaking out of that Bucket of yours FFS.
And about all students arriving daily to Ireland that can’t find accommodation.
Why can’t these levers be used to solve our acute accommodation crisis.It is not just about 10,000 homeless people.It is also about all the people on waiting lists around the country who need to settle down and not be moved from one HAP to the next indefinitely.
It’s about people who want to own their own house for their families and want to stop handing over a salary every month to a landlord.
Any government is essentially a management company employed by the people of the state. The suggestion that the people should manage state affairs is simply silly. What the government are (perhaps idealistically) trying to do by way of helping house our eastern European cousins is commendable, but said government should not and cannot lose sight of those in need here also…the single mothers with kids who have to search for a hotel room evey two weeks, as an example. Why else is any government in place if not to manage? That said, I wish them, us and our guests the best of luck
And what about our own homeless people
This same Minister hasn’t pulled many levers to house many IRISH People. The appearance of him just turns me off , a complete joke of a Man.
Divide and conquer oldest Rule in the Political handbook…..
What’s wrong with the private rented sector (there are loads of vacant buildings in small towns all over the country where nobody seems to want to live for some reason). Like this horrible building: https://www.daft.ie/commercial-property-for-sale/the-square-castlepollard-co-westmeath/3714317 And not meaning to be harsh, but they must be able to secure a minimum wage job and pay their own way and fail at that before leaning on the tax payer.
have your say