The housing emergency is intensifying violence against women, according to the National Women’s Council (NWC).
In a report published on Wednesday, the group stated that the housing crisis is facilitating the exploitation of women, including situations such as sex-for-rent arrangements, reports Breaking News.
Speaking on Newstalk, NWC director Corrinne Hasson said: “The housing crisis is compounding the shocking levels of violence against women. Women leaving abuse, often with children, encounter a system with severely limited availability due to high demand, capable of only really meeting that short-term emergency accommodation need.
“More must be done to keep women and children in their homes and their communities, to stop them from falling through the cracks in the first place,” reports Breaking News.
There are more than 5,000 children currently in homeless services, alongside 4,500 women in emergency accommodation, but the organisation says these numbers are “just the tip of the iceberg”.
“Official statistics don’t count women in refuges, or families sleeping on couches,” said Hasson. “We simply don’t know how many women and families are in homelessness,” reports Breaking News.
“What we do know is that domestic violence is a leading cause of women’s homelessness, and that the housing crisis is enabling exploitation of women, for example in sex for rent exploitation.”
The organisation’s research indicates that family homelessness has a strong gender dimension, with 56 per cent of homeless families led by a single parent — the vast majority of whom are women, many of whom may be fleeing violence in the home, reports Breaking News.
Women attempting to leave abusive relationships with their children are often confronted with stark decisions, which can mean choosing between homelessness or returning to their abuser.
Certain groups of women are disproportionately impacted by the housing crisis, including lone parents, Traveller and Roma women, and women in the international protection system, reports Breaking News.
The NWC is urging the introduction of stronger legal safeguards to ensure women and children experiencing abuse can remain safely in the family home, with perpetrators removed instead.
The report forms part of a submission intended to inform the forthcoming Child and Family Homelessness Action Plan being developed by the Department of the Taoiseach and the Department of Housing, Local Government and Heritage, reports Breaking News.
The action plan is due to be published in the spring of this year.
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