Messages of Action, Support & Solidarity

D8HAC statement regarding arrest and charging of activists in a liberated decommissioned flat in Tom Kelly Flats, Charlemount Street.

“On Sunday evening 29 of June activists from D8HAC joined members of An Spreach Housing Action Commitee together with other political activists at the site of a recently liberated social housing stock flat in Tom Kelly Flats on Charlemount Street in Dublins South Inner City.

The flat itself,the property of the people had been decamped of tenants and boarded up by the estate manager,Dublin City Council.

This perfectly habitable home has remained abandoned since then despite the fact that there are tens of thousands of families languishing on social housing lists nationwide and hundreds more homeless,struggling to cope in harsh temporary accommodation or indeed actually living on the streets.

Housing activists took the valiant decision to reclaim the property and liberate it from its uninhabitable state of criminal abandonment.

As a consequence of this several activists were arrested during a large Garda operation that seen every available area car for the entire South City engaged for almost an hour.

The activists were detained under Section 13 of the relevent Trespassing Act and held unnecassarily for several hours until they were finally charged under a different section(section 11)of the same act to appear in court on 26 of July 2014.

It is our belief that the reason for the arrests,prolonged detention and alteration of the section was strategic and political.

We commend the action and behaviour off all those involved and would like to make public our support for these activists who intend to fight this injustice.”

Tom Kelly Flats demolition has already began without an actual regeneration plan in place.This happened in O Devenney Gardens also despite a plan and a Developer under the Public Private Partnetship model.To this day O Devenney has not been regenerated and in fact the community has been torn apart.The state refused to admit its failings by over reliance on the market through private developers dependence to deliver social housing.The state should have stepped in but did not.It disguised its neo liberal for profit housing policy behind the lie of not having available funding due to economic collapse.

This lie was blatant as only around the corner from O Devenney Gardens the state continued to pump tax payers money into completing the new court buildings on Parkgate Street.

They will spend billions to jail us but near nothing to house us.

éirígí – Dublin:

Vacant Housing Liberated- 8 arrested

Over the weekend members of An Spréach, a new housing action committee, liberated a vacant housing unit in Tom Kelly Flats in Dublin City Centre and began the process of getting it ready for a homeless family to move in.

Last night following a major Garda operation against the initiative, 8 housing activists including three members of the D8 Housing Action Committe there in support, were arrested, charged with trespass and will appear on court on July 23rd.

This direct action by An Spréach and D8HAC, aimed at taking genuine action to tackle the housing crisis is very welcome and should be supported by all concerned at the growing numbers on housing waiting lists.

Well done An Spréach and D8HAC- Housing is a right not a privilege!

https://www.facebook.com/eirigi.ballyfermot?fref=ts

 

IRSP – Dublin:

 

On June 29th An Spreach Housing Action Committee as well as other political activists were arrested by the Free State reaction force in Tom Kelly flats in Charlemount Street. In days running up to the arrests one flat was liberated and a few days later the activists were arrested in the liberated flat. The flat was in the process of being painted and cleaned up to house a single mother and her child. The political activists arrested were from different political backgrounds, anarchists, socialists and republicans, including a member of the Dublin Irish Republican Socialist Party. All activists came together to help and try combat the housing and homeless issue. Altogether eight activists were arrested under section 13 of the tresspassing act. All eight were held for a few hours in Garda custody, later charged with section 11 of the trespassing act and are to appear in court on the 23rd of July.

The housing and homeless problem is a very big one, 5,000 homless across the country tens of thousands on the housing waiting lest. But yet there are tens of thousands of empty houses, apartments and flats all over the country. Instead of housing people in the empty housing the government rather board up the buildings and let them fall into ruin. The flats in Charlemount Street are owned by the people so therefore it’s the peoples right to move into them.

An Spreach is an excellent example how people and individuals from different political backgrounds can come together to unite to try combat certain issues. Let this be an example for the future for different party’s, groups and tendencies to come together to fight the common enemy, the enemy of the worker, the exploited and oppressed.

Please lend your support to An Spreach Housing Action Committee.

https://www.facebook.com/dublin.irsp?fref=ts

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