Need for more RAPID regeneration

Community activitists and residents in Dublin's south inner city have been successful in their efforts to regenerate the local area. Its designation as a deprived community has brought in State resources but more are needed to address the poverty and inequality experienced by those who live there. Rory Hearne reports

In 2001 the South West Inner City (SWIC) area of Dublin, known as Canal Communities, was designated as one of the 25 most deprived urban communities in the State and included in the RAPID (Revitalising Areas by Planning, Investment and Development) programme. It contains Fatima Mansions, St Michael's Estate, Tyrone Place, Bluebell and Dolphin House Flats (the largest local authority flat complex in the State).

The area has been transformed in recent years by a significant increase in employment and large-scale office and apartment development. Those in the 25-44 age group, most of whom are living in the private rented sector, increased by 34 per cent between 1991 and 2002. Migrants now make up 10 per cent of the population.

A number of the large local authority estates, traditionally with high poverty and exclusion rates, are being regenerated by Dublin City Council through Public Private Partnerships (PPPs). The land on the estates is given to a developer who demolishes the existing local authority flats and replaces them with new social, affordable and private dwellings.

The City Council's initial regeneration plans proposed a reduction in social housing units, continued resistance from local communities, in the form of local tenant groups and organisations such as Tenants First, forced them to include more social units than initially proposed. While tenants are delighted with new housing, some community workers, such as Eilish Comerford, a regeneration worker in St Michael's Estate, warn that little will change for people unless significant funding is provided not just for physical regeneration, but vitally for social regeneration, particularly health and education.

Community workers are openly critical of PPPs. They see them as a means by which the Council reduces its responsibility to house lower income families. Instead of increasing social housing numbers, they are giving public land over to private apartments, leaving low-income households with little option but to enter the precarious private rented sector.

Recent research that used data collected in the Census of 2002 concluded that the Canal Community area is more affluent and deprivation has declined since 1996. However, the Canal Communities Local Drugs Task Force stated in its recently launched Strategic Plan: "While it may be true that those living in the Canal Communities are relatively more affluent than they were in the past, significant levels of deprivation continue ... poverty is an enduring feature of life in the Canal Communities area ... there is more of a polarisation than an equalisation of the class structure in the area."

The 2002 Census showed that almost 50 per cent of the population in the area were in social classes 5 (semi-skilled), 6 (unskilled) and 7 (those never in paid employment), an almost identical position to that in 1998. Social class 7 had increased by 10 per cent, the largest increase in any class, from 20.5 per cent to 30.5 per cent.

Serious, problematic, drug use remains an enduring issue in the area and new trends show a significant increase in the use of cocaine. An enduring legacy of opiate use is the high incidence of HIV and hepatitis B and C in this area.

On 15 February hundreds protested at the Dáil over inadequate State support for drugs services.

Preventative services, particularly for early school leavers are inadequately resourced and some are struggling for survival. There are large waiting lists in the area for the homework clubs and after-schools projects.

Early school leaving affects nearly one in five young people in Ireland. Twenty-five per cent of pupils in poorer areas suffer severe literacy. The problem of early school leaving is especially acute for Travellers and other ethnic minorities.

Admission rates to third level reflect the continuing structural inequality in education at primary and secondary level. In 2004 participation rates at third level were 32 per cent for the area, in comparison to the national average of 55 per cent. Admission rates in Bluebell were only 10 per cent in comparison to 86.5 per cent in Dublin 14.

The Canal Community area has a higher percentage of lone parents than the national average. In 2004, three out of every ten people in a lone-parent household were living in consistent poverty. This is four times the national average and is far higher than all other household types.

Inequality in health is a major issue in this area. In 2003, there were 79 per cent more deaths observed among men aged under 65 in the lowest socio-economic groups for circulatory diseases than the highest socio-economic group. For cancers 70 per cent more deaths were observed. In 2003, 39 per cent of people surveyed identified financial problems as the greatest factor preventing them from improving their health. Despite such a clear health need in working-class areas, one of the most disadvantaged areas within SWIC, Bluebell, has never had a sitting GP.

Éamon Ó Cuív, Minister for Community, Rural and Gaeltacht Affairs, accepts that while RAPID has not ended disadvantage in the target areas, it "is having a positive effect on reducing social exclusion… RAPID is another example of Government promises being delivered."

However, the promise made by Ahern in 2001 at the launch of the RAPID programme to "see the situation of deprived areas turned around" has not been delivered.

The face of deprivation is changing – it's no longer just in large local authority estates but increasingly amongst low-income families and migrants in the private rented sector in inner city areas. The structural exclusion from health, housing and education that motivated RAPID – still remain in this area.