Fresh call to use vacant hospital to house homeless people after two die in the Grand Canal
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Fresh calls to use vacant buildings in Dublin city to house the homeless have been made after two men were found dead in the Grand Canal on Saturday morning.
The men, who were in their 40s, were homeless at the time of their deaths, it is understood. They are believed to be Irish nationals.
Tents line the canal where the men died. And some may be being pushed closer to the water by barricades erected in a bid to stop people from camping there, some homeless campaigners now say.
Asylum seekers who pitched tents along the canal, near Charlemont Bridge where the bodies were found on Saturday, were removed by the State and barriers were erected there earlier this year.
But Keira Gill, founder of A Helping Hand, a voluntary organisation which provides outreach services to homeless people in Dublin, said that people climb over the barriers and camp there anyway because it’s one of the few places they feel safe.
This can effectively push them to camp closer to the water, she said.
On Thursday, Waterways Ireland, which is responsible for the canal, told the Oireachtas Public Accounts Committee (PAC) that €125,000 has been spent on the barriers so far.
Ms Gill said that barriers "are not the solution." “Houses are. And mental health and addiction services.”
Garda investigations into both deaths are ongoing.
Gardaí have identified both individuals, but the formal identification process is still ongoing. The results of post-mortem examinations and local enquiries will determine the course of Garda investigations.
Local Labour Party Councillor Dermot Lacey said that the men’s deaths were “a tragedy.” He also said that control of the canals should be brought back to the local authority from Waterways Ireland, which has headquarters in Enniskillen in the North.
The HSE should make the nearby empty Baggot Street Hospital available as accommodation, he said.
He said that he has campaigned for years for this but it has been allowed to fall into further disrepair while remaining vacant.
The Department of Housing said that in early 2022 in response to a humanitarian crisis, the former Baggot Street Hospital was included on a list of HSE sites/properties identified as vacant which the Department of Health subsequently submitted for consideration to Department of Housing, Department of Children, Equality, Disability, Integration and Youth (DCEDIY), Department of the Taoiseach and in turn to Local Authorities and the Land Development Agency.
But "following high-level studies by the interested parties, it was deemed not feasible to bring the building to standards required for accommodation or housing purposes due to the challenges of working with a protected structure, scale of investment and timeframe involved."
The HSE said that a portion of the site off Haddington Road, adjacent to the Old Baggot Street Hospital building, has been identified as a suitable location for the future development of a Primary Care Centre to serve the South Dublin Inner City area. An application for planning permission for the new Primary Care Centre on the Haddington Road area of the site has recently been lodged, it said. The HSE said:
“The HSE has engaged the services of a conservation architect to complete a report on the building and any maintenance recommendations contained within the conservation report will be included in an ongoing maintenance programme for the site,” the HSE said.
Ms Gill said that she has safely occupied empty buildings over the years, providing shelter for homeless people over cold winter months and Christmas, but was repeatedly “dragged out” by the authorities.
One building she occupied more than six years ago remained boarded up since they were forced out, despite State promises to make it available to the community, she said.
A record 14,159 people were living in emergency accommodation in May, with 9,843 adults and 4,316 children, according to the latest figures from the Department of Housing.
Additionally, 2,300 asylum seekers are currently without accommodation, according to the DCEDIY’s latest figures, released on Friday.