About 600 Ukrainians transferred from student accommodation to pledged homes

At least 600 Ukrainians who have had to move out of student accommodation in recent weeks have been placed in spare homes or rooms offered by the public, the Department of Equality and Integration has said.

These figures do not include numbers from the 1,500 Ukrainians who were moved out of student accommodation last weekend, ahead of the new college year starting.

A spokeswoman for the department said it was “not aware of any situation where people were due to move out this weekend and an extension had to be sought of use of the student accommodation”.

Figures up to last Thursday show about 600 Ukrainians moved from student housing were placed in pledged accommodation, such as vacant houses or spare rooms offered by the public. “We are currently collating the information from the transfers which took place over the weekend,” the spokeswoman said.

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Tent accommodation

Where Ukrainians were not moved into pledged accommodation, they were housed at temporary sites, such as community or sports halls, or tents at camps such as Gormanstown in Co Meath.

The department said that where pledged accommodation was not available or was declined, people were housed in “another short-term accommodation option”, which was of “varying standards”.

During the summer, there were about 5,000 Ukrainians put up in student accommodation, which officials had begun moving elsewhere as contracts to lease the housing came to an end. Heading into the recent weekend, close to 3,500 Ukrainians remained in student housing, with 1,500 of those having been due to vacate the accommodation last weekend.

The State has been under immense pressure over recent months to find housing for the tens of thousands of refugees who have arrived in Ireland fleeing the war in Ukraine, as well as significant numbers of asylum seekers from other countries.

The pledged housing system, set up by the Irish Red Cross, faced criticism over early delays following up on the 25,000 offers from the public to house Ukrainians in spare houses or rooms.

Lower than expected

The number of properties that eventually materialised as available and suitable to take in people was significantly lower than officials expected.

Liam O’Dywer, interim general secretary of the Irish Red Cross, said the total number of people placed in pledged housing would reach about 4,000 by the middle of this week. Initially, the Government had hoped to have moved 6,000 Ukrainians into pledged accommodation by the end of the summer.

Mr O’Dywer said the humanitarian charity was still receiving a “handful” of new offers of pledged properties each week.

Where households offered to take families with children into spare rooms, only 1,500 people have completed a required Garda vetting process, which Mr O’Dywer said was “not a great figure” out of the numbers who initially offered shared homes.

However, he said in some cases delays contacting people about their offers led to them taking in individuals or families outside of the official process. The Irish Red Cross has started to follow up with about 700 households which offered to house families and began but did not finish the vetting process.

After moving Ukrainians out of student housing, the focus would shift to transferring people in temporary sites, such as those sleeping in tented camps or community halls, into pledged accommodation, Mr O’Dywer said.