More than 5 percent of Traveller households in Dublin are living in emergency homeless accommodation

Around five percent of Traveller households in Dublin are living in homeless accommodation, according to Dublin City Council’s draft Traveller Accommodation Programme for 2025 to 2029.

By contrast, about 0.7 percent of the general population across the four local authorities in Dublin is homeless.

The number of homeless Traveller households doesn’t include others in overcrowded houses and sites, inappropriate accommodation without full services, sofa surfing, or sleeping rough.

According to the draft report, 51 Traveller households are currently living in emergency homeless accommodation out of 905 Traveller households identified in the city.

Shay L’Estrange, coordinator at the Ballyfermot Traveller Action Project, says many Travellers are living in overcrowded conditions and face discrimination when trying to access private rented accommodation.

So when people start having children, they have nowhere to go and can often become homeless.

“The private rental market is not a solution to the housing crisis, most particularly for Travellers,” he says. “Councils are also failing to deliver.”

The council’s last Traveller Accommodation Programme ran from 2019 to 2024 and the council didn’t build any new homes for Travellers during that time, according to a review contained in the new programme.

However, it did install electricity and sanitation for Travellers living at two sites which had previously been classed as “unauthorised”.

The council plans to provide 250 homes for Travellers over the next five years, its draft plan says.

Dublin City Council didn’t respond in time for publication to queries sent Friday, as to whether it has locations in mind for these and if construction is underway on the ones scheduled for completion next year.

Failing to deliver since 1999

Three national organisations – the Irish Traveller Movement, Pavee Point, and the National Traveller Women’s Forum – made a joint submission on the development of the Traveller Accommodation Programme for 2025 to 2029.

According to the submission, more than 8,000 Travellers nationwide need accommodation, including around 2,000 families in overcrowding or “emergency provision”, or living on roadsides.

Councils are obliged by law to “deliver culturally appropriate accommodation in all its forms, including halting sites, group housing schemes, standard houses and transient accommodation”, it says.

Among other things, the three organisations called on councils to identify sites on which to build Traveller accommodation as part of their county and city development plans.

L’Estrange, of the Ballyfermot Traveller Action Project, says Dublin City Council should outline where it will build the Traveller-specific homes in its city development plan.

“The previous city manager [Owen Keegan] used the excuse that it would tie his hands,” he says. “With his hands not being tied he built nothing, so let’s tie your hands for a while to see if you build something.”

The new chief executive of Dublin City Council, Richard Shakespeare, should become directly involved in overseeing delivery, he says.

In the first ever Traveller Accommodation Programme, launched in 1999, there were plans to regenerate accommodation at Labre Park in Ballyfermot, he says. A quarter of a century later the regeneration of Labre Park again features in the programme but no work has been completed.

The council has presented multiple plans to the community, says L’Estrange. “The community agreed with DCC on a number of occasions what the houses would look like,” he says.

But despite buy-in from the community the plans never proceeded. “It is plan after plan and nothing happens,” he says.

The community in Labre Park are frustrated, living in desperate conditions. “They remain at the table,” he says. “I think that speaks volumes for the community that is involved and it questions the ability of the Traveller accommodation unit to build.”

The Department of Housing is also part of the problem, says L’Estrange.  The latest plan for Labre Park couldn’t go ahead because the Department of Housing refused to fund flood works on the site, he says. ”

The latest plans for Labre Park were turned upside down in 2020 when a flood risk was identified affecting part of the site, scheduled for redevelopment. A council official said recently that planned flood defences should alleviate that risk.

In other areas too, Traveller organisations are forming the view that the department is holding up delivery, says L’Estrange. “The vibe we are getting is that the Department is dragging its feet in relation to funding Traveller accommodation,” he says.

Traveller organisations are losing faith in the council’s process, the Local Traveller Accommodation Consultative Committees (LTACC).

“A number of organisations are questioning the whole idea of the LTACC as an effective forum for delivering Traveller accommodation,” says L’Estrange.

One of the reasons new Traveller accommodation is difficult to deliver is because of people objecting to it in their area.  “In a 2020 survey, 46 respondents said they would feel uncomfortable with Roma and Travellers as neighbours.”

Traveller-specific accommodation

Dublin City Council says it plans to build 50 new homes in Traveller specific accommodation, over the next five years.

On top of that it plans to deliver 15o homes in what it calls “standard housing assigned to Traveller specific” and it will buy 5o homes for Traveller households in “acquisitions assigned to Traveller specific”.

Traveller specific accommodation is supposed to be designed to meet the cultural needs of Travellers, some of whom prefer to live in extended family groups.

The Irish Traveller Movement website says: “On the basis of their culture, many (but not all) Travellers today prefer to live in what is called ‘culturally appropriate’ or ‘Traveller specific’ accommodation – namely, halting sites or group housing schemes, where large extended families live together based on Traveller’s shared identity.”

But Dublin City Council appears to be classing any housing in which it accommodates Travellers as Traveller-specific accommodation, says L’Estrange. The council and the Department of Housing should clarify what they mean by Traveller-specific accommodation, he says.

People Before Profit Councillor Hazel de Nortúin says the target for Traveller-specific new builds is too low. She also doesn’t expect that 50 new homes will be delivered.

She says the Land Development Agency should deliver some Traveller-specific accommodation in each of the large sites it develops.

Council managers often acknowledge that they are not doing well on delivery of Traveller accommodation and commit to doing better, says de Nortúin. “They give all the spiel and absolutely nothing is done,” she says.

“I don’t blame the Traveller community for being disillusioned with it at all,” she says. “It’s the huge shame of my time on the council that we haven’t managed to progress any Traveller accommodation at all and I’m on it eight years.”