Fears for "surge" of homelessness following lifting of eviction ban dominate city council meeting
Modular homes and even wood cabins were proposed as "part of the solution to the housing issue" as councillors supported a motion to reverse the government's eviction ban.
Modular housing and “wood cabins” have been proposed as potential ways of providing social housing by Cork city councillors fearful of the impacts of the recent government decision to reverse a moratorium on evictions.
500 tenants in Cork who were served an eviction notice in Q3 of 2022, according to data released by the Residential Tenancies Board, had evictions deferred until this April.
On March 7, government parties agreed to lift the temporary moratorium on evictions which has been in place since October 30, 2022, meaning these eviction notices, plus any that have been subsequently issued, will come into force.
“The lifting of the eviction ban is going to lead to a surge of people losing their homes,” Cllr Mick Nugent told Monday night’s Cork City Council meeting. “I know the council was looking at a second homeless hub, but exactly what provisions are in place for the anticipated surge is not clear.”
“Wood cabins”
“I’m dreading what’s coming in the coming months, the number of calls and number of emails,” Togher Cllr Thomas Moloney told Monday night’s city council meeting. “I have people coming to me that can’t get social housing but they don’t have enough income for the affordable housing, and private rental is not affordable or achievable.”
“It isn’t going to be enough and I don’t really know how we can ramp it up. Maybe we could be looking at emergency legislation to negate the planning laws.”
Cllr Moloney was suggesting using “wood cabins” to tackle social housing demand as an interim measure, which he said could be done for between €25,000 and €35,000 for a two-bed unit.
“We need radical ideas and radical thinking,” Cllr Moloney said. “We are in an absolute crisis and we can’t walk away from it.”
Cllr Moloney was not the only councillor suggesting temporary accommodation units, with Fine Gael councillor Damian Boylan proposing a motion for “fast-track approval” for modular and pre-fabricated housing units at the meeting.
“We need to call on planners to get real and accept the reality of the situation,” Cllr Boylan said. “We’ve gone beyond a situation where normal rules apply. I’m not talking about turning planning into the Wild West here at all. I’m talking about a pragmatic view of what needs to be done to address a certain element of this. I fear as well for what’s coming. We need to get inventive and we need the support of the executive on this.”
Mahon modular houses for Ukrainians might make solution “politically accepted for Irish stock”
Southside Fine Gael councillor Des Cahill pointed out that 50% of the city’s estimated 7,000 housing list for social housing was single people. “The gap in the market is affordable to rent, single apartments, not three-bed houses,” he said.
He supported the idea of modular social housing.
“They’ve started in Mahon for refugees, and I think when people see them, they’ll accept them for our own stock,” Cllr Cahill said. “I don’t think that would have been politically accepted for the Irish stock but I think that when they see them, they’ll be accepted and their use might change.”
“I agree with putting in the best quality. When you look at what they’ve taken down on the Northside and the Southside, we’re not making that mistake again and we need to put in proper facilities for those that need them.”
133 modular units are currently proposed for the Model Farm Road and Clover Hill Court in Mahon.
“The Council is also exploring the delivery of further schemes via rapid build methods, and all possible avenues for expediting delivery are considered as part of the capital programme,” the Director of Housing said in a written response.
Cork City Council are currently working towards delivering 1,737 affordable housing units and 3,934 social housing units by 2026, the meeting heard.
Council voids
Meanwhile the council’s track record on “voids” - council houses that are vacant - came under fire for the length of time some social housing is lying empty. “We need to fast-track and not be spending 15 months trying to do a place up,” Cllr Joe Kavanagh told the meeting.
The housing directorate are working with “a very ambitious target” to reduce the turnaround periods for vacant social housing to 32 weeks by the end of 2023, the meeting was told.
There were 837 vacant social houses at the end of 2021 and it was taking the council 75 weeks to restore and relet them, as we reported last November.
280 vacant council houses
However, the most recent figures reveal that there were 352 council houses vacant at the end of January 2023, down from 384 in December 2022.
280 of these houses were awaiting repairs, while 72 had been repaired and were under allocation.
Cork City Council own 10,577 houses, providing accommodation to 27,090 people.
“It is expected that significant improvements in turnaround times will be achieved in newly vacant units and that the existing backlog will be cleared by early 2024, funding permitting,” the Director of Housing said in a written answer to the council meeting.
However, just 3.7% of a €19.5 million allocation for maintaining and improving local authority housing was spent in January 2023, a total of €711,600.
Local will to extend the eviction ban
Sinn Féin councillor Eolan Ryng’s motion that “Cork City Council appeals to the Government to reconsider their decision and, in line with opinion expressed by Cork City Councillors in February, extend the eviction ban.” got widespread support at the council meeting and echoed today’s announcement that his party will introduce a Dáil motion to extend the ban.
“Just in terms of the people we’re dealing with, they’re coming in to the office in tears, they can’t see where they’re going to go and there are no answers for them,” Independent councillor Mick Finn said. “This motion is just about adding our voice to ask the government to reverse this decision.”
Dublin Green Party TD Neasa Hourigan had earlier appeared to criticise party leader Eamon Ryan when she said Green Party values and policy were “not represented” at the leader’s meeting where the decision to lift the eviction ban was made: she and fellow Green TD Patrick Costello have called for the moratorium to remain.
Green Party councillor Oliver Moran appeared to echo his party colleague’s stance at Cork City Council’s meeting, saying that “essential preparedness for the lifting of the eviction ban” hadn’t been put in place.
Cllr Moran had asked for clarity on the local authority’s policy on “the use of delegated powers to purchase homes with tenants in situ who are HAP or RAS tenants facing eviction for reason of sale.”
Tenants in situ
Under the tenants in situ scheme, the local authority can buy a house where the tenant is at risk of eviction due to the landlord wanting to sell their home: the Residential Tenancies Board reports that 60% of landlords nationally gave eviction notices in Q3 of last year because they were exiting the rental market.
However, Cllr Moran criticised the lack of information available from national government on details of this scheme.
“Over the last period there has been the provision for buying houses with tenants in situ but there hasn’t even been a circular sent around saying how local authorities should do that,” he said.
Cork City Council had 117 contacts from landlords or tenants where tenants are at risk of homelessness, and has purchased three houses with tenants in situ since June 2022, with five more purchases progressing and 33 potential cases under review, a written response to Cllr Moran’s question noted.
“Leave your political hats at home”
Cllr Moran was amongst several councillors to call for a pragmatic approach to the housing situation rather than political point-scoring.
“This shouldn't be about political footballs, but about the people who need our protection,” he said.
Lord Mayor councillor Deirdre Forde, FG, echoed his sentiments: “I would ask you to leave your political hats at home and come in with real solutions,” she said. “It’s not all yet lost, but we need to get real and it’s a very serious situation. We’re solution-oriented in here.”
However, not all councillors were in agreement.
“The political decision to preference one class of people, ie the landlord class, over everyone else’s need to have a roof over their heads, is a decision that has been made by this government and previous governments for decades,” Cllr Lorna Bogue told the meeting. “So it’s just surprising to me, that we have a situation that has been created politically, yet the outcomes of that we’re not supposed to discuss as political.”
“That, to me, is to ignore where this crisis has come from.”
It was agreed that the next sitting for the council’s Strategic Policy Committee for Housing should be moved forward to ahead of April’s lifting of the eviction ban, to allow for further local planning.
READERS: ARE YOU, OR SOMEONE YOU KNOW, FACING AN EVICTION? WE WOULD LOVE TO HEAR FROM PEOPLE FACING EVICTIONS AND TO SHARE THEIR STORIES, AND WOULD PROTECT ANONYMITY IF NEEDED. WE BELIEVE IT’S IN THE PUBLIC INTEREST TO REPORT ON THE SITUATIONS PEOPLE ARE FACING. PLEASE, GET IN TOUCH.
You can email us at emailellieobyrne@gmail.com or jj.odonoghue@gmail.com.
This is so important - the government should be forced to follow up immediately with operable solutions to their decisions, not more guff. Thanks to councilors for keeping it on the agenda - keep it up