lead to bad treatment with the patient never recovering.
The word I would choose to describe our housing system is dysfunctional. The Greek origin of the word connotes something ‘bad’, ‘abnormal’ or ‘difficult’. The Latin root speaks to a ‘lack’ of something. In more recent times the word means an abnormality or impairment in an organ or system. But it has also come to describe the disruption of normal social relations.
This gets to the very heart of the matter. Housing is not just a physical thing, the bricks and mortar, timber and steel within which we live. It is a relationship between the providers and the occupiers, between the State and the market, between people who create homes for families who in turn create communities.
A functioning housing system is one in which all people have access to safe, secure and affordable accommodation to meet their needs. It is a system in which everyone has a place they can call home.
Of course, our current housing system functions for some, those who have access to a home. Nor is there any doubt that there are those who benefit from the dysfunction, whose profit is dependent on the system being perpetually bad, abnormal and difficult. But for many, indeed globally for the majority, accessing safe, secure and affordable accommodation is uncertain and is certainly a struggle.
Today in Ireland, and across much of the world, our housing system is completely dysfunctional. It is bad, abnormal and difficult. More importantly these negative experiences for millions of people are the result of abnormal and impaired relationships between the key players in the system. And these are damaging wider social relationships, creating hardship, insecurity, fear and anger.
If you believe, as I do, that good-quality, safe, secure, appropriate and affordable accommodation should be for the many not just the few then understanding the way in which these relationships have become abnormal and impaired during the course of the modern history of housing provision is crucial if solutions are to be found.
Real People
Of course words, no matter how descriptive or evocative, cannot fully capture the lived reality of housing stress facing tens of thousands of families and individuals. Every single day, ever growing numbers of people find accessing secure and affordable accommodation difficult if not impossible.
This book is motivated by their stories and is written in an attempt to help solve the problems they face.
Una and Sean
Una is a full-time mother. Her partner Sean has a badly paid job. They used to live in private rented accommodation with their five children until the landlord raised the rent to an impossible level. In the two years before receiving their Notice to Quit rents had increased 20 percent.
They presented to the Council’s homeless desk. With only nine years on the housing list they still had two years to go before an allocation. All the desk clerk could offer them was hotel accommodation on the other side of the city.
Every morning they would leave the hotel at 6.30am and take the two-hour bus journey to drop the kids to school. Each starting at a different time. Sean would head off to work while Una would wander the streets waiting for collection time, staggered from 2.30 to 4.30pm.
Then they would make the long bus journey back to the hotel, tired and cranky, stuck in rush hour traffic.
The hotel room was clean but there was no place to cook or to store their stuff. Homework was a nightmare with all five children trying to read and write sprawled out on the large double bed. Health and safety meant the children couldn’t leave the room unattended. It was suffocating.
And then there were the arguments. The children’s behaviour started to change. Una’s relationship with Sean was under real strain. There was no advice, no help, nowhere to turn to. Sure they could have talked to friends or family but the shame of not being able to provide for their children forced them to put a brave face on their daily struggles.
Looking back it is hard to believe that they lasted the full fourteen months. When the call came from the Council with an allocation in Una’s old estate it was like a million Christmases came at once. The joy in the children’s eyes was indescribable.
They have moved in now and their routine is back to normal. But Una can see the difference in the family. The youngest one is more introverted. The eldest more bold. And Sean, well he doesn’t say much but he still hasn’t gotten over the shame of it all.
Laura
Laura and her young twins live in the box bedroom of her mother’s Council house. To be honest, box is an overstatement. Between her bed, the bunk-beds for the girls and all the kids’ things there is literally no space to move.
Her mam and dad have the main bedroom. Her sister has the other bedroom. And her brother sleeps on the couch. Laura doesn’t recall the house feeling so cramped when she was growing up.
She remembers when the babies were born. Their father was so happy. He promised he would have the deposit for a flat saved in a few months and that Laura could decorate it whatever way she wanted. They knew it would be a long wait for a Council house but that didn’t matter. His job wasn’t bad and the prospect of more hours was good.
The babies were just 18 months old when the crash happened. They never caught the driver of the car that caused the accident but the CCTV clearly showed they were drunk, careering down the wrong side of the road. The damage from the crash was so bad Laura never got to see his body.
She cried for a month. Only the twins kept her going. Sure she had to hold it together for them. But now the girls were six. Six long years trapped in the box bedroom.
Laura has been to every TD and Councillor and they all tell her the same thing. The waiting time for a two bedroom is eleven years long. Without medical or homeless priority she just has to wait it out. The idea of another five years cooped up in the box bedroom is hard to face.
The damp started to appear after the girls turned four. Big black patches in the corners and around the window sills. Laura is convinced it is making the girls’ asthma worse. The Council say it’s condensation and she should open the windows more often. Are they serious? It’s cold enough in here what with the old rotten wooden window frames. She’s not sure which is worse, the damp musty smell of the mould or the sharp stink of bleach that hangs in the room for days after the weekly clean.
Five more years. The girls will be eleven before they have a place they can call home. But then at least she’s not stuck in some grotty BnB in the city centre. The girl across the road was almost two years homeless. At least she has her family and friends around her. But still … five more years …
John
John was employed all his life with the Corporation. He was an honest and hard-working man. He and his wife bought the family home in the 1970s. A beautiful semi-detached house in one of the new private estates. The kids were born. Wages were good. He was happy. Until the drink took hold.
He doesn’t remember how long it took but the marriage eventually broke down. He left the house and got digs in the city centre. Eventually he dried out and got his life back together. But too late to patch things up at home. That part of his life was gone forever.
He managed to keep his job. Sober for ten years, he secured a promotion and life went on. His landlord was a decent man. Charged a fair rent, kept the flat in good order, never intruded.
But now John is retired, his pension is small and the landlord is selling up.
