Sir, – A recent spate of letters has, once again, illustrated the frustration and despair felt by those caught up in Ireland’s housing perma-crisis.
This is not a small group of people. We’re talking about couples, families with children, single people, over 50s, students, Travellers, disabled people, immigrants, refugees, people sleeping on the street, people with good jobs, Irish people living abroad and unable to return home, couch-surfers, adults stuck in childhood bedrooms ... the list goes on.
This is not an unsolvable problem. The causes have been clearly identified and many workable solutions put forward over the years, from the Kenny report of 1973 to those in Rory Hearne’s excellent book, Gaffs – not to mention plenty of other good ideas since.. There are a number of European cities that have applied creative solutions to housing needs, which have produced concrete results.
There is one fundamental barrier to solving Ireland’s housing crisis once and for all – and it is not a lack of supply. It is in people’s minds.
RM Block
Housing is now seen, worldwide, as an asset and a means of accumulating wealth. It is no longer seen for what it truly is, which is a basic human right to a home.
If this were merely the attitude of a neoliberal government or greedy investors, it might have been possible to prevent what has happened. In reality, this mindset was absorbed by the person on the street – seduced by the idea of a top-up to their pension, a leg-up for their children or an increase in personal wealth that their jobs could never have provided.
There is nothing wrong with any of these ambitions. The problem arises only when the means of fulfilling their dreams denies others access to one of the most basic of all needs – a roof over one’s head.
The cognitive dissonance that allows some people to ignore the fact that they bought at a time when it was possible to do so on a modest income, had parents who could afford to help them, or got a mortgage for a buy-to-let on the back of already owning a property, leads to wilful blindness.
Many people further indulge in victim-blaming to ignore the appalling suffering that has resulted.
This is no longer just about individuals. We are at the point of societal breakdown as a result of the lack of affordable housing. We need to examine our own attitudes and see beyond our own short-term interests.
We also need to acknowledge that the property rights enshrined in Article 43 of the Constitution are not absolute. They’re “regulated by the principles of social justice” and may be limited in the interests of the ‘common good’. It’s about time we stood up for this.
Without first accepting secure and affordable housing is not a privilege but a human right, no amount of reactive Government “solutions” will change things. – Yours, etc,
JESSICA FREED,
Mercer Street,
Dublin 2.
