Councils are unlawfully refusing people access to homeless accommodation, say lawyers

Charities that provide legal advice on housing issues are calling on council chiefs to revoke a protocol councils rely on to refuse people access to homeless accommodation in their areas.

It has no basis in law, solicitors say.

The protocol, which was issued in 2023, says a person can only get homeless accommodation in the county where they have their main local connection. 

So if they aren’t judged to have that connection the council they are presenting to should only provide homeless accommodation for up to five nights. 

It was issued despite a commitment in early 2021 from then Minister for Housing Darragh O’Brien that local connection criteria would not be used to block access to homeless services. 

This protocol is too blunt an instrument, say some advocates for homeless people. 

It does not advise council staff of any exceptions to the local connection rule, even for those fleeing criminal intimidation, human trafficking, or domestic violence in their original county, they point out. 

There are often disputes as to which is the main county for the local connection too, says Adam Boyle a solicitor with the Mercy Law Resource Centre, which has provided legal advice to hundreds of homeless people who were refused access to homeless accommodation in the place they asked for it.  

More fundamentally, though, there’s no legal basis for councils to come up with this rule that they can refuse homeless services to people who don’t have a local connection, Boyle and another solicitor say.

“There is no requirement in law for a household to have any local connection to an area to access emergency accommodation there,” says Mary Heavey, solicitor with Community Law and Mediation. 

Councils cannot make up the rules either, Heavey says. A High Court judge ruled in 2012 “that a housing authority cannot introduce additional eligibility criteria over and above those in the relevant legislation”, she says. 

A spokesperson for the County and City Managers Association (CCMA) says the protocol reflects a shared commitment to treat every individual and family with dignity and care, and to provide clarity in accessing support.

It “enables local authorities to apply a structured process in delivering emergency accommodation and support services, while maintaining a person-centred approach and facilitating discretion where it is deemed appropriate and exceptional”, they said.

The CCMA is reviewing the protocol, says the spokesperson, and will consider potential exceptions required for extreme cases. 

The local connection

To apply for long-term social housing in a county other than the county in which you normally live, it's necessary to demonstrate a local connection.

That could be that you live there or work there, have children in school there or that you have deep family connections in that county. 

Some people – Travellers, recent arrivals to the country, and others – may struggle to prove a local connection to any county. However, for emergency accommodation, that shouldn’t be an issue, say both solicitors. 

The local connection rule applies to long-term social housing, not to emergency homeless accommodation, they say. 

Still, Boyle says he has had clients who were refused emergency accommodation by multiple local authorities and ended up sleeping rough or in a car as a result. 

Three of the four Dublin councils refer to some form of a “local connection” requirement on their websites when outlining who can access emergency homeless accommodation.

Dún Laoghaire-Rathdown County Council says: “If you don’t have an application for social housing support with us or a connection to the area, please contact your relevant local authority for help”

South Dublin County Council says it will consider whether the household is eligible for social housing with it when considering whether they are eligible for emergency accommodation.

Fingal County Council says it only helps those whose last permanent address is in Fingal. 

Boyle says this is wrong. “Homeless assessments, unlike social housing applications, are supposed to occur quickly and in response to the emergency situation of a household experiencing homelessness,” he says. 

The questions for the homeless assessment are: do you have somewhere to stay, and do you have the means to provide your own accommodation? he says. 

But council managers want the local connection criteria to apply to emergency accommodation, as they want an established exit route, says the protocol. “Households entering emergency accommodation should have an identified exit mechanism through the provision of social housing supports.”

In late 2020, the Dublin Region Homeless Executive refused to provide emergency accommodation to people sleeping rough, who it said were from other counties. 

But in early 2021, the then Minister for Housing, Fianna Fáil TD Darragh O’Brien, said that the local connection should not be a barrier to homeless people getting accommodation.  

“I have instructed all housing authorities that local connection criteria should not be a barrier to accessing services,” he said. “I am keeping this under review to ensure it is adhered to.”

In 2023, the Mercy Law Resource Centre had a 157 percent increase compared to 2022,  in people who were refused emergency accommodation based on the local connection, says Boyle. 

They dealt with almost 200 cases in 2022 and 2023, he says. And the number of cases has continued to increase. “It is now the majority of our work,” he says. 

Says Boyle: “You shouldn’t need a solicitor to access homeless services.”

A spokesperson for the Department of Housing says that if a person is assessed as homeless, the council they go to for help can accommodate them. 

“Any household assessed as homeless may be placed into temporary emergency accommodation without the requirement to undergo a social housing assessment,” he said. 

A spokesperson for the Dublin Region Homeless Executive says it may be in the person’s best interest to return to their original county, especially if they have accumulated time on that social housing list or if their schools and support networks are in that area. 

“A key aspect of prevention is ensuring that the applicant's long-term housing needs are properly addressed, even when they are at risk or facing a crisis,” he says. “Neglecting this consideration can lead to unfavourable long-term outcomes.”

Allowing exceptions

“A one-size-fits-all protocol about local connections will mean, and does mean, that people are not getting access to the services that they need and deserve,” says Ber Grogan, executive director with Simon Communities of Ireland.

People in substance-use recovery might want to make a fresh start somewhere new, Grogan says, while others could be fleeing from domestic violence. 

“It is inappropriate to suggest that someone fleeing domestic violence must stay in the area that they have been living in due to a local connection protocol,” she says.

A Department of Housing spokesperson said that, normally, emergency accommodation is provided by “the relevant local authority where an applicant has a local connection, or normally resides”. 

But councils do have discretion to provide accommodation to someone who is homeless, but who “resides outside the local authority functional area”.

The spokesperson for the CCMA says it is now reviewing the protocol “to ensure it remains responsive to emerging needs and challenges”. 

“This includes consideration of complex cases such as those involving domestic violence, intimidation, human trafficking, or other exceptional circumstances,” they said.

An appeals process?

Last year, the Oireachtas Joint Committee on Housing, Local Government and Heritage recommended that “a robust and independent appeals mechanism” be included in the new Housing Bill.

Ultimately, an independent appeals process to review council decisions is needed to cover both social-housing decisions and decisions relating to emergency accommodation, says Heavey, the solicitor at Community Law and Mediation. 

“An independent appeals mechanism would provide an appropriate avenue of review for households and would also bring about great transparency and consistency in decision-making across local authorities,” she says. 

Focus Ireland has lobbied for an appeals process for council decisions to be included in the new Housing Act 2025. 

Local authorities need an appeals process, says Boyle and they should provide written reasons for their decisions, he says. 

At the moment the only options available to people to challenge the council's decision is to complain to the Ombudsman – whose decision is non-binding on the council – or to take a judicial review. 

Often the council is very adamant that it won’t accommodate the person, he says, until a solicitor gets involved.

“In our experience, once legal intervention has been applied, many local authorities resile from this position, sometimes waiting as long as an application for leave for judicial review to have been made before providing emergency accommodation,” he says. 

Judicial reviews are not the way to resolve these issues, they are a waste of everyone’s time, are very expensive, and the route is simply not open to everyone, says Boyle. 

Some councils insist the household has completed a social-housing application, which takes months, before they can get emergency accommodation, he says. 

“All the time the person is sleeping on a couch, sleeping on the streets or sleeping in a car,” says Boyle. “That is a broken system.”