Appearing before the Joint Oireachtas Committee on Housing, Local Government and Heritage, IHREC director Deirdre Malone told TDs and senators that the State’s failure to address long-standing problems including damp, mould, sewage issues, infestations, poor insulation, fire safety concerns and chronic repair delays amount to an ongoing denial of the right to adequate housing.

The committee session follows recent reports that plans for the regeneration of Oliver Bond House have been halted.

The commission will outline how Ireland remains in breach of its obligations under the European Social Charter almost a decade after the European Committee of Social Rights found that the State had failed to ensure adequate housing conditions for many local authority tenants.

In repeated follow-up assessments, most recently in 2024, the committee found that Ireland had still not brought the situation into compliance and that progress on regeneration had stalled.

Ms Malone said: “Families in Dublin’s inner-city flat complexes have waited years, in many cases decades, for safe, healthy and dignified housing conditions. What residents continue to experience is not simply poor housing policy; it is a persistent failure to vindicate basic human rights.

“Children are growing up in homes affected by damp, mould, leaks, pest infestations and chronic disrepair while regeneration projects face repeated delays, uncertainty and now, in some cases, cancellation. That is unacceptable in a modern republic.

“The European Committee of Social Rights found in 2017 that Ireland was violating the rights of families living in local authority housing. Nearly ten years later, the State still has not remedied those violations. Delays are not neutral; they perpetuate harm and deepen inequality.

“Residents and communities must be placed at the centre of regeneration decisions. Human rights require meaningful participation, accountability and urgency. The State cannot continue to defer action while people remain living in inadequate and unhealthy conditions.”