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Community activists in Finglas claim that they have evidence that a family has moved from a privately owned and managed homeless accommodation centre into a house that is owned by Dublin City Council, but which was not advertised as available for people seeking social housing.
National Party representative, Stephen Redmond, who has stood as a candidate in the general and local elections, was contacted by residents of Finglas West regarding the allocation of a house that had been vacant for several years. A video about the case has generated much interest across social media platforms.
The house in question had been owned by a local family for more than 30 years and was bought by Dublin City Council in September 2025. A local Councillor has confirmed to a resident that the house has been allocated. A family has visited the house over the past week as preparations are made for them to move in.
As with social housing in many other parts of the state, especially where it has been vacant for some time, there was considerable interest in if and when the house would be offered.
There are many people from Finglas who are on the waiting list and many who would be interested in such a house. Yet it appears not to have been advertised through Choice Based Lettings.
Choice Based Lettings lists available social housing and those eligible and on the waiting list then make ‘bids’ and are assessed according to various criteria including time on list, household need, residency in the state, medical and other conditions.
There is no officially available ranking of the qualifying criteria but the houses are supposed to be listed on Choice Based Lettings which was not the case in regard to the house in Finglas West.
A local resident told Gript that the family who were viewing the house, in the company of a person who appeared to be from Dublin City Council, informed them that they had been living in Marlborough Mews – a homeless accommodation centre in Dublin 7 not far from the Phoenix Park.
That centre is owned by a company called Bluebros which is part of the ‘Banty’ McEnaney group of companies. Bluebros is owned by Christopher McEnaney and Conor McEnaney who are nephews of Séamus ‘Banty’ McEnaney.
Bluebros bought four of the eight units at Marlborough Mews, which are now the homeless accommodation centre, for a total of just under €2 million in September 2023. The company has done extremely well from their contracts to supply accommodation to Dublin City Council and has been one of the main beneficiaries of the wider Banty network of providers which was reported to have drawn down more than €35 million for homeless accommodation in Dublin in 2025 alone. This is apart from the vast sums they have been paid through IPAS.
I contacted Dublin City Council to ask them if they accept referrals from Bluebros and allocate social housing to people moving directly from Marlborough Mews “into social housing that has not been advertised publicly on Choice Based Lettings.” The terse response to that was “No.”
I further enquired as to “the standard procedure by which persons living in privately managed homeless accommodation are moved onto the waiting list and into housing.” The Council informed me that “Applicants apply for social (housing) through the standard national assessment. Allocations to qualified households are made in accordance with the adopted Scheme of Lettings.”
It would appear to be the case that refugee families who have been in emergency accommodation may now be being given priority by DCC, although that ought to be subject to their having been granted residency. It is not a guarantee of an offer and it ought not override other priority cases nor be allocated without the house being advertised through Choice Based Lettings.
I also contacted Bluebros but received no reply to my questions regarding the placement in question and any possible role they may have in referring people to DCC for social housing, either directly or through one of the Approved Housing Bodies.
Given the connection between the McEnaney companies and IPAS, and the more than half of persons officially homeless in Dublin who are not Irish citizens, there are questions to be asked regarding the allocation of both this form of accommodation and the use of social housing to provide homes to persons from overseas.
The pattern until the last two years was that the numbers in IPAS ‘direct provision’ had grown with the increase in arrivals. Why now then is it the case that IPAS accommodation numbers remain steady even as the number of persons who have applied for International Protection continues to increase.?
Since January 1, a total of 2,251 new applications for International Protection have been made. Yet, over the same period the number of people staying in accommodation provided by the International Protection Accommodation Service (IPAS) has only increased by 201.
In 2025 the numbers in IPAS accommodation increased by just 220 between the start of January and the end of December, during which period 13,146 new people arrived into the State to apply for International Protection.
So even if the more than 5,000 people who were in IPAS accommodation but who had been granted residency had been moved into social housing, or private accommodation, it would seem that thousands of persons still in the system are being accommodated in other than IPAS centres.
Is it the case then that the Department of Justice – in the clear absence of new commercial centres coming on stream and the loss of potential state-owned centres such as Lissywollen – are using social and private residential accommodation to house people who have not been granted asylum nor any other right to residency?
We have already seen that this is partly explained by the role of Associated Housing Bodies (AHBs) like De Paul. De Paul, in one report, stated that 70% of their placements were of people who had been in IPAS accommodation.
I also uncovered that the Department of Justice itself has bought, or taken over from other state agencies (as with the house at Forgehill, Stamullen), residential properties that it is using or intends to use for the accommodation of persons who have applied for asylum.
Is it now also the case that private contractors who provide emergency homeless accommodation are acting as a conduit for asylum applicants who are provided with social housing? And that the State is using social housing as an alternative to controversial and increasingly difficult to find commercial IPAS accommodation?
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