Numbers needing social housing in Dublin city top 43,500

More than 43,500 people are waiting to be housed by Dublin City Council, the highest number ever.

The number of people on the social housing waiting list has increased by almost 1,400 in just six months from July to January, according to the council’s housing allocations report to be issued to councillors this week.

More than a year since the publication of the Government’s social housing strategy, which aims to eliminate housing waiting lists by 2020, the numbers in need of housing in Dublin are continuing to grow, but homes were allocated to just over 1,000 families and individuals in the city in 2015.

Applications

Last July for the first time the council produced figures not only detailing the number of applications made for social housing but the numbers in each household on the list. Then there were a total of 42,106 people waiting to be housed, including almost 16,500 children. In the intervening six months that figure has risen to 43,584 with more than 17,000 children now waiting for homes.

Last July there were 21,592 applicants who, on behalf of themselves or their families, applied to be housed. That number now stands at 22,355.

Of 17,054 children waiting to be housed, almost 10,500 are living in single-parent households. Single parents are twice as likely to be in need of housing as couples with 6,636 single parents on the waiting list and 3,360 couples with children. However, single people with no children make up the largest group of applicants with more than 11,500 on the waiting list. Some 1,547 people who have made applications are categorised as homeless.

Ten years

More than 90 per cent of applicants are waiting over a year and more than 40 per cent are waiting over five years, with almost 8 per cent of those waiting over 10 years. Some 47 per cent, or 10,603 applicants are waiting between one and five years. Considerably more than half the applicants, 12,559 want a one-bedroom flat. However, the combined total of single people, and applicants who are couples with no children, is less than this figure, meaning there are 100 people on the list who have children, but have been assessed as needing a one-bedroom flat.

Less than 10 per cent of applicants seek, or are assessed as requiring, a three-bedroom home and only very small numbers, 212, are waiting for a four-bed home, with 34 applicants on the list for a five-bed unit.