Homeless campaigner Sr Stanislaus Kennedy has warned that one of the primary causes of homelessness in Ireland is the number of evictions in the private rented sector by landlords seeking to maximise their profits at the expense of families left with nowhere to live.
The founder of the homeless charity, Focus Ireland, called for improved legislation to better secure the rights of tenants.
Discussing the worsening housing crisis and the fact that 9,698 people are homeless in Ireland currently, 3,829 of whom are children, the popular social justice champion warned that the instability in the private rented sector meant anybody is at risk, from a young couple with their children to the elderly.
Stressing that the commitment to social and affordable housing must come from the State, the nun who turns 80 in 2019, blamed the homeless crisis on the policy of successive governments leaving the provision of social housing to the market rather than local authorities.
“The Government and politicians seem to be expecting the market to provide housing, but it won’t. The market doesn’t have a social conscience and the market is profit driven, so it won’t provide social housing.”
The Christmas season, she stressed, was particularly difficult for families living long-term in emergency accommodation, as it affected not just the children but “the whole development of the family".
Separately, Sr Stan, who joined the Religious Sisters of Charity in 1958, also spoke about the hostility expressed towards her congregation over its ownership of a Magdalene laundry in Donnybrook.
“The negativity is directed at nuns. Everything is thrown together, the orphanages, the Magdalene homes, the Tuam babies, Vincent’s hospital – it is all thrown together and mixed up and it is all anti-nuns.”
“Things happened which were not right and of course they should be exposed. I also know that great things happened, and I know nuns who did extraordinary work, I couldn’t hold a candle to them – they worked day and night.”
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