People living on Ireland’s roads have told us of the drastic measures they must take to avoid deaths and injuries as the so-called ‘Trondheim Troll’ regime grips the nation.
With temperatures set to drop well below freezing over the next few days, the Irish Mirror spoke to those hardest hit by the weather.
Dominic spoke to us from Ha’penny Bridge in central Dublin.
“At the moment, I sleep down at Connolly Station. There are maybe 20 of us who sleep down there every night. We sleep close together for body warmth. We usually have cardboard underneath us and a sleeping bag over us. We sleep tightly together for body warmth. During the day, we might go to Brother Luke’s for breakfast or dinner, other than that we walk the streets all day. We have got nowhere to go. We are sleeping at Connolly Station,” reports The Mirror.
Dominic says the scale of Dublin’s homelessness problem is underestimated by those in power.
“Half of the city centre is homeless. You go into any of the laneways or back alleys, they are all sleeping [rough]. What you see in daily life [in Dublin], this is the reality. All the laneways are full of homeless, there are homeless sleeping out in the cold every night. There are, easily, 1,000 people sleeping out in the city centre. Easily,” reports The Mirror.
A second man, David, is 69 years old. Irish Mirror spoke to him in front of the GPO on O’Connell Street.
He explained how far he will go to escape the cold.
“I will do something small to get into prison. I have just come from prison – I was in there over nine months on a trespass charge. I refused to leave a hostel when I was given two hours’ notice.” he says, reports The Mirror.
“The medical treatment there is a joke, they are hopeless there. I’m not interested in bringing a case for my own sake because I’m out now but for the sake of other prisoners, someone needs to tell the story of what’s going on in there” reports The Mirror.
David struggles to believe that a political solution is imminent.
“I think the Government have got themselves into a right mess over the years by not doing what they should be doing and it is getting late now. It is too late for a lot of [homeless] people,” reports The Mirror.
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