Carmel Askin never foresaw herself being homeless in retirement.

In the last 18 months, the 66-year-old has moved house five times.

Unable to afford accommodation in Galway, she turned to her previous occupation to become a live-in carer.

However, it has been precarious.

When a person she had been looking after died, Carmel had to find accommodation somewhere else.

Rents were unaffordable, so she declared herself homeless with the Council in Galway and contacted Galway Simon Communities for support.

The charity helped her find accommodation to rent, but Ms Askin could not sustain the payments after six months.

Her only choice was to return to caring and to live with older people requiring support.

Two weeks ago, she moved into the home of a woman who she is helping in exchange for accommodation.

Speaking at an event held by the Simon Communities in Galway as part of a week-long campaign highlighting homelessness, she outlined the physical and mental toll.

“In my last job, I was burned out at the end. I had come to the end regarding the amount I could give. My body was exhausted.”

The average rent in Galway is €2,300 per month, and with little to no HAP (Housing Assistance Payment) properties available, an increasing number of people like Ms Askin are “couch surfing”.

“Even in just the few months since I’ve started looking the rents have gone up, so even with HAP I wouldn’t be able to afford them,” Ms Askin said.

These people are not included in the monthly homeless figures released by the Department of Housing each month, because they relate solely to people living in emergency accommodation.

Latest figures show that 16,353 were recorded as homeless in August.

It is an increase of 295 on the previous month, and 131 of those are children.

People over 65 make up a small cohort of the overall homeless figures, however, Chief Executive of Simon Communities Ireland, Ber Grogan, has pointed out that just a number of years ago, child homelessness was in the hundreds.

There are now 5,145 children recorded as living in Emergency Accommodation.

Therefore, the Simon Communities said action is required now to tackle over 65s becoming homeless, before the situation gets out of control.

According to the CSO, the older population of 781,400 recorded in 2022 will grow to over 1.94 million by 2057.

Chief Executive of Alone, Seán Moynihan, has pointed out that the number of over-65s renting went up 83% in the last census, and it’s becoming an increasing issue for the charity.

At the Simon Communities event in Galway, it was also pointed out that gender must also be taken into account because women are more likely to take time out of the workforce to become carers.

This puts them at more risk of homelessness.

Ms Askin does not know what the future holds. She is not convinced that she will ever be able to afford rent in the current climate, never mind a home of her own.

Marshall Family

Marshall Family

Ten year fight

EU countries have agreed on the urgent need to create a “wall” of anti-drone defences, after airspace violations by Russia rattled eastern members.

Focus sharpened on the threat this week after unidentified drones forced Denmark to shut some of its airports.

EU defence commissioner Andrius Kubilius held online talks with ministers from some ten EU states mainly along the bloc’s eastern border, with Denmark joining after the drone incidents there.

Ukraine – which has developed a raft of capabilities to detect and shoot down Russian drone swarms more cheaply – also took part.

“The repeated violations of our airspace are unacceptable. The message is clear: Russia is testing the EU and NATO. And our response must be firm, united, and immediate,” Mr Kubilius told a news conference in Helsinki after the talks.

“At today’s meeting, we agreed to move from concept to concrete actions.”

Mr Kubilius said ministers backed a broad plan to bolster the EU’s eastern defences and said the “immediate priority” should be a “drone wall, with advanced detection, tracking, and interception capabilities”.

Ukraine’s defence minister Denys Shmygal said his country was “ready to participate” in the project.

“The drone wall will create a fundamentally new defence ecosystem in Europe, of which Ukraine is ready to be a part,” he wrote on social media.

Polish incursion

EU officials say the initial focus would be to develop a network of sensors to help better detect any incursions.

They say the aim is to have that first stage ready within a year – but building capabilities to intercept the drones would take longer.

EU chief Ursula von der Leyen made a first call for the “drone wall” in a keynote speech earlier this month, hours after NATO shot down Russian drones in Poland.

The NATO response to Russia’s drone incursion in Poland showed up the gaps in the alliance’s arsenal for tackling that threat.

Read more:
NATO to beef up eastern flank following drone incursion in Poland
Romania scrambles jets after drone incursion during Russian attack on Ukraine

NATO had to use top-of-the-range fighters firing costly missiles to shoot down a handful of cheap Russian drones.

The alliance has rushed more hardware to its eastern flank in the wake of the incident, but still lacks the sort of low-cost capabilities Ukraine uses.

The “drone wall” proposal is part of Europe’s broader push to bolster its defences in the face of the threat from Russia.

Mr Kubilius has said the programme should be one of the new flagship defence projects that the bloc is working on.

EU leaders are set to debate the defence push – and potential new initiatives – at a summit in Copenhagen next week.