Neighbourhood of strangers: AirBNB and the commodification of housing
Figures published by the Department of Housing this month indicate that the number of homeless people in Ireland has reached the 10,000 mark. Responding to the escalating figures, Minister for Housing Eoghan Murphy said that current housing policies ‘were working’, but that the nature of the housing crisis meant it could never be ‘turn[ed] around...
The Issues of General Election 2016: Housing
Five years after the 31st Dáil was elected on the backlash of the property crash, housing remains one of the most contentious issues in the run up to General Election 2016. Different housing approaches have been taken over the course of the state’s existence, with each holding specific benefits and downsides to its social stakeholders....
Individualistic Homelessness: Housing the roofless
While decriminalising drug possession is a simplistic and ultimately self-defeating approach (a topic to be addressed in a future article), it must also be realised that incarceration is not a suitable response to dealing with social problems such as narcotic abuse, and will ultimately only succeed in increasing rooflessness, itself a gateway to narcotic use....
Structural Homelessness: Life on hold
In 2008, the Department of the Environment, Heritage and Local Government released the strategy document, titled The Way Home: A Strategy to Address Adult Homelessness in Ireland, 2008-2013, providing a positive vision on the future status of homelessness by stating that: “From 2010, long term homelessness (i.e. the occupation of emergency accommodation for longer than...
Housing: replacing the wobbly pillar
The recent election of Joan Burton as the 11th leader of the Labour party brings hope to its members of a change in the fortunes of their party which faced an electoral nightmare in the local and European elections. But comments made by Burton that ‘a Labour priority in the remainder of this Government’s term would...
