THE GOVERNMENT must provide dedicated funding to move people from private emergency accommodation to supported housing, if it is to have any hope of meeting its target of ending long-term homelessness by late 2010, Focus Ireland said yesterday.
The housing charity made the call in its prebudget submission and said providing housing with support would actually save money. Its chief executive, Joyce Loughnan, said the cost of housing a homeless family in private emergency accommodation with no support averaged €29,000 per year while the cost of accommodating the same family in mainstream housing with support was €12,500.
“Focus Ireland believes that if this approach was taken for all the people in private emergency accommodation who are ready to move on to live in mainstream housing, it would dramatically reduce the number of people who are homeless and also save the Government a significant amount of money every year, estimated to be over €10 million,” she said.
Ms Loughnan said a dedicated revenue stream to fund housing support services was “essential” to allow this work. “Such a move would not only be good for the exchequer but good for the 5,000 people homeless in Ireland.”
She said the housing charity was relying on the Government to honour its word and protect the most vulnerable in the budget.
Cutting welfare, rent supplement and community-based poverty initiatives while failing to invest in protecting jobs and homes would broaden and deepen poverty and result in more homelessness, she warned.
The charity is a member of the Poor Can’t Pay Campaign which is opposing cuts to basic welfare payments and the minimum wage, and seeking the payment of the social welfare Christmas bonus.
Calls for help from Focus Ireland have increased dramatically this year. Focus Ireland worked with over 5,500 people accessing its services last year but, by the end of this June, it had already worked with more than 4,000.
Disability charity the Rehab Group has said people with a disability face extra costs of living. In a prebudget statement, the charity called on the Government not to reduce their welfare payments.
A 3 per cent cut in welfare payments, as recommended to the Government in the McCarthy report, would equate to a cut of over 10 per cent for some welfare recipients with a disability, the charity said. It said the fall in the cost of living had not benefited people with a disability.
Angela Kerins, Rehab Group chief executive, said research from the National Disability Authority and Indecon recognised people with disabilities face increased costs for things like home alterations, personal assistance, special food or clothing, and travel for hospital appointments equating to an average €40 extra per week.