HOMELESS CHARITY THE Peter McVerry Trust has opened a 100 beds for homeless people over the past number of days, bringing to just under 1,000 the number of beds they provide across the country.

The 100 new beds form part of the 333 that were promised in the government’s winter strategy. They are “permanent” beds that will stay in the system after winter and are located across Dublin, Kildare and Meath.

PMVT is heralding the opening of the beds as a milestone in its service in that it now provides nightly accommodation for just under 1,000 people affected by homelessness. 

Latest figures show  that there were a total of 6,157 homeless adults and 3,811 homeless children living in state-funded emergency accommodation in Ireland in November. 

The vast majority of these are living in the Dublin region, where PMVT’s services are mostly located. 

The homeless charity – which was set up by Fr Peter McVerry in the 1970s – is funded by government through the Department of Housing to carry out essential services for Ireland’s homeless population.  

These include providing long- and short-term accommodation and hands on support and advocacy for people without homes.

PMVT is also part-funded funded through donations from the public. 

Commenting on the opening of the new beds, Pat Doyle, CEO of the organisation said:

“This additional capacity means that Peter McVerry Trust is now delivering support to just under 1,000 people, with 980 people accommodated each night in our homeless services, the largest provision to date.

This new provision comes at the end of an exceptionally busy year for Peter McVerry Trust when we expanded provision across all areas of the organisation including our detox service, our U18s residential aftercare programme and secured significant capital investment in our housing programme.