The numbers of people who die while homeless in Limerick may soon be officially recorded following the passing of a motion by one of the counties foremost advocates for the homeless.
Aontú Cllr Sarah Beasley asked Limerick City and County Council to write to the Minister for Housing requesting the recording of figures of people who have died in homelessness in Limerick.
Cllr Beasley says
“Currently and shockingly , Dublin City Council is the only local authority in Ireland that records deaths among people experiencing homelessness. In 2023, 56 homeless people died in Dublin. By October 2024, 40 people had already died – including tragically a child under 17 years old. The peak year was 2021 when 64 people died. These are not just statistics – these are human beings, whose lives were tragically cut short. Some had families, some hadn’t, some had jobs maybe, some hadn’t, but they all had stories and they all had intrinsic value as people.
How can the government claim to be addressing homelessness when they don’t even know how many people are dying because of it? I find this staggering, sad and bizarre in equal measure. The absence of recording creates a dangerous invisibility – people are dying without their deaths being acknowledged or their circumstances investigated. Recording these deaths is the absolute minimum requirement for a truly compassionate society that values all its citizens.
Every person who dies while homeless deserves to have their death acknowledged and investigated. Their families deserve answers. The deceased themselves serve it. Recording deaths ensures accountability from service providers, identifies system failures, and highlights where intervention is desperately needed. It also allows us to learn from tragedies and prevent future deaths.
Housing policy, homeless services, mental health supports, and addiction services should all be informed by accurate and evidence based data on outcomes – including deaths. Without this data, we’re making policy decisions in the dark while vulnerable people continue to die.
This motion is about basic human dignity and evidence-based policy. We cannot continue to ignore the deaths of our most vulnerable citizens simply because we choose not to count them. Recording homeless deaths in Limerick would honour those we’ve lost, provide accountability for services, and inform better policies to prevent future tragedies. If Dublin can do it, every county can and should do it. The time for action is now”.
