ISSUES HOUSING CRISIS
Union Representative Advanced Senior Course The Union Representative Advanced Senior Training Course is for union representatives who have completed the Introductory and Advanced course and who have experience as a union representative in their workplace
Course content
The history of trade unionism and development ofThetheemergence market system The impact of globalisation trade and open markets inFreea modern society Certification and Progression: Members who successfully complete this training course will obtain a Mandate certificate. They may progress to the FETAC level 5 Certificate in Trade Union studies or other relevant training courses offered by Mandate. If you are interested in this course, please contact your Mandate Official or Mandate's Training Centre at 01-8369699. Email: mandateotc@mandate.ie
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Musicians Aidan O’Halloran and Raymond Hegarty provided a musical opening to proceedings at Housing Action Now’s manifesto launch event in Dublin
Housing Action Now’s manifesto for change By Oisín Fagan HOUSING Action Now, a new collective of community workers, activists and researchers, launched their housing manifesto on Tuesday, June 12, in Dublin. Opening the launch at the Teachers’ Club, Chairperson Seanie Lambe introduced musicians Aidan O’Halloran and Raymond Hegarty who played a number of songs on the theme of homelessness. After this rollicking start, community activist John Bissett, a founder of Housing Action Now, spoke briefly about how the group came together as a response not only to the housing crisis in Ireland but also to that across Europe. He explained that Housing Action Now was an active member of European Action Coalition for the Right to Housing and the City, and read out letters of support from various major housing campaigns across the continent. After this, Joe Lee and Fidelma Bonass presented Scattered, a short film about the failed regeneration project in O’Devaney Gardens and the resulting destruction of their homes and community. Mick Byrne then took to the floor and thanked the other housing groups and the residents of O’Devaney Gardens for attending the launch, before speaking about the group’s manifesto. He made it clear that up to now, the Government’s housing policy had to use €67 billion of public money on NAMA – an institution, he added, that had not helped on single Irish household out of the approximately 100,000 households in mortgage arrears. Mr Byrne claimed that the real solutions to the arrears problem was a total restructuring of mortgage debt to reflect the interests of those who
held the mortgages – not the banks that profited off them. He then talked about the chaos in the private rented sector, describing the refusal of rent supplement as a form of discrimination against the poorest in society, adding that the current rate of rent supplement was out of touch with costs and that it needed to be increased immediately. Mr Byrne insisted that rent control needed to be introduced across the board as lower income families were living in fear of unregulated rent hikes. He closed by calling for a general moratorium on evictions from principal family residences, which was greeted by loud applause. Next Eilish Comerford and Paul Hansard spoke about the Government’s total failure to provide sustainable social housing for its people, leading to waiting lists of a decade or more. They linked this failure to the Government’s unsustainable reliance on profit-seeking private companies to provide homes, stating that it was willing to finance and incentivise private builders.
Proper response
Both speakers insisted that the only proper response was immediate, wide-scale construction of quality social housing, directed and planned by the State. In his contribution, Daithi Downey took the floor to address the explosion of homelessness across the country, speaking of the sometimesirreversible damage and suffering it caused families, individuals and communities. He claimed that homelessness is now a much greater risk than it has been for decades, pointing out that sometimes families were only one bank statement or one illness away from being out on the streets.
Closing the talk, Damien Walsh, of the Irish Traveller Movement, outlined how the Traveller community had been disproportionately hit by austerity. He urged a lockdown on councils that refused to grant available sites to Traveller communities and said that swift action was needed as now more than 10% of his community were officially homeless and without any form of accommodation. Finally, Seanie Lambe opened the floor for questions. TDs and councillors from the United Left, People Before Profit, Sinn Fein, and independents who were present at the meeting urged unified direct action among the various housing groups and across the broad left spectrum, claiming that the manifesto was the starting point upon which people could begin to work. Left to the floor, single parents, migrants, community activists, and those directly affected by the crisis, spoke and it soon became clear that the housing crisis manifested itself along class lines, with the poorest being the hardest hit. It was repeatedly made explicit that all government housing policy up to now had only been implemented to help the rich protect their wealth, while workers and communities suffered. It was agreed by all present that direct housing action was a necessity, that housing was a human right, and that unless communities, workers and the unwaged mobilised and united to protect their rights, the crisis was only going to get worse. Housing Action Now organisers urged attendees to share their manifesto, follow them on Facebook, Twitter, and on their website at http://housingactionireland.wordpress.com, and to attend future rallies, protests and meetings to discuss strategy. SHOPFLOOR
y July 2014