Well Get Out Of That Kitchen

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90207063

A pots and pans protest outside the Dáil during the banking crisis

Should you have a kitchen.

Free in an hour?

Emma Jane Dempsey writes:

If you happen to be in the vicinity of the GPO at around 4pm today you might notice that the city center is slightly louder than usual.

A large number of community groups who work with the homeless community are organising a “Pots and Pans” protest march from the GPO to Dail Eireann on the first day government are back from their annual summer hiatus.

The groups include the Irish Housing Network (responsible for the recent occupation of Bolt Hostel), A Lending Hand, Social Workers Action Network, Jacket Off Your Back, an Spreach, Help the Hidden Homeless, Help 4 The Homeless and many many many more.

Keira who is part of the Irish Housing Network and who works with Lending Hand based in Dublin City, says:

“Twice a week on a Monday and a Thursday we go out and feed and clothe the homeless and hidden homeless on our streets and every week it gets worse and worse. Last Monday we fed upwards of 180 people.”

This week it was also revealed by the Department of the Environment that the number of homeless families in Ireland has increased by 76% since January.

While the official homeless figures take the vast majority of the homeless community into consideration, there is no way of gathering data on the number of Irish people currently struggling to secure affordable housing whom are staying with friends and family on an ongoing basis.

Just shy of 10,000 tenants are moving into rental accommodation per month at a time when the number of available rental properties is at it’s lowest in recent times.

Due to a lack of appropriate emergency accommodation currently available citizen support groups for the homeless have found people sleeping in hedges, in parks, behind shops and in a variety of other places some without even a tent for shelter.

In some cases the government are handing out sleeping bags as a replacement for emergency accommodation which is just not acceptable according to the groups.

Keira says

“The system is corrupt and it just isn’t working. There is no recovery. We are going backwards to the 70’s. Someone somewhere is planning on making a lot of money on empty buildings but right now there are upwards of 290,000 boarded up buildings and 90,000 on the housing list. The government won’t listen so we feel our protest can make them listen because you cant miss the noise of pots and pans with a passionate crowd to speak for those with no voice.”

Everyone is welcome to join in, and if you find yourself with out pots and pans a good shouty voice will do just fine.

*croak*

Pots and Pans Protest (Facebook)

(RollineNews.ie)

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19 thoughts on “Well Get Out Of That Kitchen

  1. orla

    The people of Montreal recently protested like this and it was extremely effective at overturning the government in power at the time.

  2. baz

    yawn,

    maybe get a job people, a real productive contribute to the economy and pay tax job, theres plenty of work out there but theres as many lazy entitled whiners too.

    want better? work for it, stop depending on handouts, freebies and entitlements

      1. Anne

        “a real productive contribute to the economy and pay tax job”

        That contribute make perfect sense. You need to pay tax job too.

  3. scundered

    Oh the cheek of her with what looks like a fully aluminium handled Stellar pot, that’s proper ammunition for the likes of Joan Burton.

  4. Owen C

    “Someone somewhere is planning on making a lot of money on empty buildings but right now there are upwards of 290,000 boarded up buildings and 90,000 on the housing list.”

    There isn’t, there really isn’t.

    1. that data is based on the 2011 census. we have since sold on and occupied many of those home given the demographics vs house construction dynamics in Ireland (around 10-15k per year erosion of stock in 2011-2015).
    2. that data includes holiday homes (55k), and temporarily vacant homes (59k),

    So we’ve probably got something more like 150k vacant homes. Sure, its still a lot, but its a lot less than the headline number, and this doesn’t even take into account that the location of many of them may be unsuitable for someone on welfare (ie remote and with no transport links)

      1. Owen C

        Sure, but lets at least stick with the facts. McWilliams has tried this same trick and i think is responsible for the latest push in this 290k figure. He’s claiming that investors are holding the 290k houses off the market to take advantage of higher house prices. Like, they couldn’t be ars3d with the 5-6% rental yields available on them, they’re just holding them off market, unoccupied. He gets paid to spout this nonsense.

      1. Christopher

        Just walk around Dublin city centre withing the canals- boarded up buildings and empty lots EVERYWHERE.

  5. Jake38

    The fact that you listed 7 different self-appointed pressure groups in the above promo tells us all we need to know.

Comments are closed.

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