Council chiefs should use emergency power to build homes for Travellers, says Department of Housing report

The Department of Housing has written to council chief executives to encourage them “to use their emergency powers, where necessary, to bypass problems with decision-making by elected members regarding Traveller Accommodation”, says a department report.

Section 24 of the Housing (Traveller Accommodation) Act 1998 allows the council chiefs to use emergency powers to carry out works needed to provide a reasonable standard of accommodation, in an emergency situation.

The report, issued in December 2023, says that the department would issue a circular on it too. The Department of Housing didn’t respond in time for publication to a request for a copy of the circular.

“It’s a really important power,” Martin Collins, co-director of the Pavee Point Traveller and Roma Centre. But one that is rarely used.

“In the 40 years I’ve been involved I can only remember it being used once,” he said.

On 8 May, at a meeting of Dublin City Council’s housing committee, council officials presented an outline of plans for their next Traveller Accommodation Programme, which runs from 2025 to 2029.

It includes eight regeneration projects and 12 new homes – but fails to identify any new sites for Traveller accommodation. It didn’t mention using emergency powers, either.

But, instead, the council report says that Dublin City Council should build Traveller accommodation as part of social housing developments going forward.

“Culturally appropriate, Traveller specific accommodation needs to be included in all future Social Housing developments,” says the council report.

Those working at Traveller organisations say there is a worsening humanitarian crisis, as more Travellers face homelessness and overcrowding.

“Local democracy has failed our people,” says Collins. “A separate Traveller accommodation authority is needed.”

Special powers

Homelessness among Travellers is increasing rapidly at the moment, says Collins.

Travellers are disproportionately represented in emergency accommodation, while others are living on the side of the road without proper facilities, or in seriously overcrowded situations.

The number who are effectively homeless is growing, says Collins. “This is an emergency situation that needs an urgent response.”

Councils are not providing enough accommodation to meet existing needs and they are also supposed to plan for and anticipate future housing needs of Travellers, he says.

Yet councils across Ireland consistently fail to identify any new sites for Traveller accommodation, he says. “This is the problem with all 31 local authorities. This is an issue we have raised many, many times.”

In May 2022, the then-Dublin City Council CEO Owen Keegan refused a request from the Office of the Planning Regulator to mark lands in the city development plan as for Traveller housing.

Jacinta Brack, political advocacy co-ordinator with the Irish Traveller Movement, says that in the three years from 2019 to 2021, councils nationwide built just 44 new homes that were Traveller-specific accommodation.

By contrast, as of 2020, 2,871 Traveller families were in need of a home, she says.

Council chief executives rarely use their emergency powers to push through homes for Travellers, says Collins.

The political reality is that council chiefs aren’t willing to go against elected representatives who often block Traveller accommodation projects going ahead in their own areas, he says.

The solution, as Collins sees it, is for the government to set up a specific agency to deliver Traveller accommodation, free from political interference. “We need a new imaginative approach.”

Shay L’Estrange, coordinator at Ballyfermot Traveller Action Project, says that the chief executive of Dublin City Council, Richard Shakespeare, should take direct responsibility for Traveller accommodation projects.

The council needs to set concrete targets for the number of new homes, in collaboration with local Traveller representatives, including timelines for completion, he says.

L’Estrange, who is also a local election candidate for People Before Profit, says it’s not just councils blocking Traveller accommodation from going ahead.

The Department of Housing has knocked back two proposals for the regeneration of Labre Park in Ballyfermot, he says. “It’s causing a lot of frustration for people.”

Concerns about flooding on the site stalled the redevelopment of Labre Park. The Department of Housing is currently examining a revised proposal, according to a council report.

Part of the housing mix

By not providing Traveller-specific accommodation, councils are “essentially forcing Travellers into conventional, standard housing”, says Collins.

The Dublin City Council’s report outlining the new Traveller Accommodation Programme, for 2025 to 2029, seems to indicate that is set to change.

“Work with Housing Development & Planning to incorporate Traveller Specific Housing within all new Social Housing Developments across the City,” it says.

Collins says he would welcome any plans to incorporate Traveller-specific accommodation into new social housing schemes, as long as it is culturally appropriate.

“In any large-scale development, I think in terms of positive action, and acknowledging the dire circumstances in which many Traveller families live, that would work,” he says.

L’Estrange, of Ballyfermot Traveller Action Project, said that Dublin City Council should clarify the number of homes or the percentage of the housing developments that it plans to deliver this way. “It has to include solid figures and not be aspirational,” he says.

At the council meeting on 8 May, People Before Profit Councillor Hazel de Nortúin said, “We have a societal issue when it comes to Traveller accommodation.”

But, she said, there has been a better approach within Dublin City Council in recent years, and no one in the council is deliberately holding back progress.

“As the largest local authority, we need to push through and show that it can be successful,” she said.

And, the Land Development Agency should include Traveller-specific accommodation as part of the mix in its public housing developments too, she said.

Neither the Land Development Agency nor the Department of Housing responded to queries sent Thursday about whether it should do that.