People Before Profit were proud to join the United Against Racism demonstration in Dublin on Thursday evening. On what was a bitterly cold evening, people from different anti-racist groups and political parties turned out in great numbers to send a clear message: Refugees Are Welcome Here.
Some basic facts: Fine Gael and Fianna Fáil created the housing crisis. We have a housing crisis because FF & FG have prioritised landlord and developer profits over housing people. We have enough vacant properties (166,000) to house all, the Government just don’t want to tackle the vulture funds and property magnates that are sitting on so many of them. They don’t even spend the full amount of their own housing budget. Year after year the Government has missed its own targets for housing built. They are sitting on their biggest ever rainy day fund when it could be used to invest in a publicly run construction company to mass build public housing. The Government continues to keep loopholes in place for landlords, hurting renters and leading to astronomical rents.
We could stop taking in refugees and we would still have all these issues. We need to stay united to fight this Government. Beware those who are letting the Government off the hook by whipping up fear over refugees. Refugees are welcome here – the Housing Crisis is the problem!
