There’s been a fourfold increase in the number of people who are homeless in Clare in the past five years.
66 people were without a home in this county at the end of April.
288 people were registered as homeless in the Midwest region by the Department of Housing on the 25th of April – that’s around 5 percent of the total number of people without a home nationwide.
66 of them were here in Clare – down slightly from March.
While the figure has remained static throughout the pandemic, it’s a more than 400 percent increase on the number of homeless people in this county back in April 2016, which stood at 16.
The Midwest region as a whole has seen a 35 percent jump in homelessness in the same timeframe.
Around 70 percent of these seeking a home in this region are male, according to the Department, with more than 60 percent of people between the ages of 25 and 44.
There were 28 families across the Midwest looking for a home, 22 of them considered single parent entities – though that’s a significant drop from this time last year.
Just seven counties – Dublin, Cork, Limerick, Galway, Kerry Kildare and Meath – recorded a higher number of homeless people than Clare at the end of April.
