Cllr spots ‘red flagsof discrimination’in complex housing application forms

A Laytown/Bettystown councillor voiced her concerns over the challenges in completing social housing applications for individuals with disabilities saying she feels that there is an element of discrimination in the process.

After a presentation on the housing allocation processes at a recent Laytown/Bettystown Municipal meeting, Independent Cllr Carol Lennon highlighted issues with the application form's complexity and the lack of support for those with intellectual disabilities.

She told of the difficulties faced by individuals with lifelong disabilities in accessing social housing due to the lack of medical professionals available to support their applications.

"One of the issues that I've had is the 36-page long application form," said Lennon.

"There is a huge issue with people understanding the application form or even having the time to fill it in," she added.

"People submit the application form and then a couple of weeks later they are contacted saying this is missing and that is missing and most of the clinics that I would be involved with is sitting down and helping people fill in the 36 pages. It is too long and it contains information you don't actually need."

When you're dealing with people who have lifelong disabilities such as intellectual disabilities, they don't have people who work with them, they don't have consultants and I am contacted every month by people saying, ‘my son is 24 he can't apply for the social housing list because we don't have an OT to do a report and he doesn't have two medical people working with him’. At the moment, that's raising red flags for me for discrimination on disability grounds."

The local authority responded by saying that the housing department's role was to identify the housing need based on the medical condition and required supporting documentation to do so.

"So a GP might advocate that there's a disability there, but we need an OT professional to tell us about the requirement from a housing need perspective so that's why there's a requirement for professionals," said a Meath County Council official.

Meanwhile Sinn Fein Cllr Maria White raised concerns about transparency in housing allocations, noting delays and lack of communication. She spoke of the need for better training for front-line staff and more proactive measures to address housing needs was also discussed.

"I have had a number of people on to me, and the problem is they have been told that their housing need is going to be met, and they're delighted. Then weeks go by before the actual offer being made, so they don't know where the offer is," said White.

"They've made a few bids on CBL (Choice Based Lettings) and it's meant to be six weeks between the offer being made and moving into your home, which is wonderful but there is a time gap between getting these calls from a housing officer and then finding out which property it is," she added.

"Maybe it would be better not to make those calls and give people hope because they might speak to the landlord and say, I'm being housed. They might even give notice which they shouldn't do unless they have a formal offer or written offer in the hand. But this is part of the process that I'm struggling to understand, because for different people, it can take different lengths of time.

"So they have had the initial call and are not hearing anything back and it leads to frustration. It increases your work load and people become very disillusioned. And they are concerned that if they keep ringing you are they going to annoy you so there is a bit of a power imbalance going on there as well.

"I'm delighted to hear that you mentioned you care because you are dealing with the most vulnerable people in society. White acknowledged the huge work load faced by the housing department and added that she believed training needs to be provided to housing officers on the front line in how to deal with people.

Meath County Council said they aimed to be as efficient as possible regarding housing allocations and communicating with applicants but delays could occur depending on the nature of the property/properties being offered and liaising with engineers.