Wexford wheelchair user could face five-year wait for adapted home as council admits shortage of disabled-friendly properties
Wexford PeopleA Wexford wheelchair user has been told it could be years before the local council finds a home suitable for her needs.
The woman in question, who currently lives in the Rosslare Municipal District (RMD), requested a transfer from her council house over 18 months ago, however, she has only just been referred to the council’s housing capital team and faces a lengthy wait to find suitable accommodation.
Raising the issue on behalf of the wheelchair user, Councillor Aoife Rose O’Brien spoke about the dangers of living in a home wholly “unfit for purpose”.
“She is falling out of her wheelchair on a daily basis because her home isn’t suitable for her,” said Cllr O’Brien at the November meeting of the RMD. “I have raised this on numerous occasions with different directors and the head of housing, it’s completely unacceptable that this woman has to remain in a home that’s unfit for purpose.
“I’ve been given a commitment that her case has been referred to the housing capital team, but how long is it going to take to find her a house? In other cases, people are being asked to live for up to five years in a home that’s unsuitable for them. Being in this house is posing a threat to her health and to the health of her one-year-old child.”
Housing officer Sharon Ryan admitted there were no guarantees that a house would become available from within Wexford County Council’s (WCC) current housing stock and that the woman in question may have to wait for a new one to be built.
“If people are on the transfer list for medical reasons we may not have houses that are suitable for them so, in that instance, we have to pass the case onto housing capital to get houses built specifically, and that takes time,” she said.
“This woman has been waiting 18 months to even get any engagement with the housing capital team," continued Cllr O’Brien. “Is this going to be the norm going forward, where someone is waiting that long for their case to even be referred? And she’s still going to have to wait for a property now. It’s not good enough asking someone to wait so long when they have a high-priority medical need.”
“I agree,” replied Ms Ryan, “I will look into the background of this case and find out what held it up so we can avoid similar instances repeating in future.”
Having regularly been contacted by people with disabilities in her own constituency, Cllr Lisa McDonald was fully aware of the difficulties many face when it comes to housing, and she called upon WCC to address this issue at source.
“Our housing policy needs to be updated to provide more houses for people with disabilities, currently only a fraction of new builds are for those with disabilities,” she said. “We need to know how many are being built and what our plans for this are moving forward, because this is becoming a recurring theme.”