The cost of providing homeless services in Dublin next year is expected to top €400 million, a greater than €50 million increase on this year, according to budget documents to be presented to Dublin city councillors on Monday.
The number of homeless people reached a record high of more than 16,500 in September, the most recent figures available from the Department of Housing show. More than 70 per cent are using emergency accommodation services in Dublin.
A decade ago, the provision of Dublin’s homeless services cost just over €90 million for the year. These costs have since spiralled, the annual increases outstripping rises in every other service in Dublin City Council’s annual budget.
For 2025 the council has set aside just over €354 million for the provision of homeless services. No reduction in need is expected next year, with more than €406 million budgeted.
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Homeless services in the capital are managed by the Dublin Region Homeless Executive (DRHE) on behalf of the four Dublin local authorities.
The Department of Housing funds up to 90 per cent of the cost of the service, but the local authorities must find the balance within their budgets. With the overall cost increasing by tens of millions of euro each year, the sums needed to cover the councils’ proportion have escalated.
The city council will bear the biggest burden of the €40.6 million needed, shouldering just over €27 million, with Dún Laoghaire-Rathdown, Fingal and South Dublin combined contributing €13.5 million.
The DRHE has submitted a business case to the Department of Housing with a view to agreeing a “more sustainable and long-term approach to funding this service” and to “increasing the level of State funding available to run this nationally important service” the council said.
“As a housing authority we have a key role in ending homelessness through delivery of social and affordable housing, but many of the drivers of homelessness lie outside our control,” the council said.
The council’s €1.69 billion budget for 2026 will also include increased rents for social housing tenants across more than 26,600 households.
The council plans to change how it calculates rents so higher earners pay more, but tenants of all incomes can expect increases, as the local authority attempts to fill a €55.5 million funding gap in its housing maintenance budget.
The move comes after an analysis of tenant incomes found more than a fifth of council households have an after-tax income greater than €1,000 a week but are paying heavily subsidised rents, with the average charge across the scheme €83 per week.
The council operates a “differential” rent system, with rents based on the net incomes of tenants. The principal earner in a household pays 15 per cent of their net weekly income exceeding €32. Up to four subsidiary earners pay a contribution to a maximum of €21 each a week – no more than €84 in total.
The council plans to increase the principal tenant charge to 18 per cent, but raise the unassessed portion of income from €32 to €55. Subsidiary earners’ contributions would almost double to €40 each a week, and the cap on the number of subsidiary earners charged would be removed.
The new charges, due to come into effect from April, are expected to provide additional income of €24.8 million for 2026 and €33.1 million in a full year.
Fingal County Council, which has some of the lowest social housing rent charges in Dublin, last Tuesday agreed a budget which would see the principal tenant charge increase from 12 per cent to 14.5 per cent – a 20 per cent hike. In addition, its subsidiary earner charge is to increase from a maximum of €40 to €60 a week.
