Testimonies of conditions in the emergency accommodation centres

Intimate Partner Violence (LGBT+)

Bukola’s story: “I arrived in Ireland with my ex-girlfriend and, unfortunately, once we arrived, we had a big fight. She got violent and she tried to hit me. I tried to talk to security and said, you know, I can’t face this, and asked what I can do because I have to live here, but I cannot be in the same place as her because I feel unsafe, and she was acting very aggressively. The security told me that as this was a domestic issue, they couldn’t get involved. I asked them if there was a way that I could leave a complaint or a record of what happened to me and they told me that they could, and when I followed up two days after, they didn’t do anything, and there was no manager that came to me and asked me about the situation, nothing at all. So, I went to IPAS and asked them if I could be moved because of my violent situation, and they actually moved me to [a current EAC place of residence].”

Sexual Harassment in a Mixed Accommodation Settings:

Bukola’s story: “As a woman that is travelling alone, I have no family here, I have no one. I feel very insecure to be alone in a place surrounded by men. The showers at [EAC] are mixed, so men and women are showering in the same place. Once when I was coming out of the showers, there was a man from a different nationality that just started looking at me, and every time that I walked by he would say, ‘beautiful’ and stuff like that. I couldn’t be by myself in there. And I had that violent ex-girlfriend in there too, so I was feeling very stressed. I asked to be moved but when I was moved to [current EAC place of residence], I realised that the situation was pretty much the same.” (That is, the showers and washing machines are located in the basement. There is no strong security presence or working security cameras to monitor the situation.)

Portia’s Story: “There was one time that I was on the elevator alone, and I was going downstairs, and the elevator stopped. There was a group of men trying to get into the elevator, and they were going up and I said, the elevator is going down. They started mocking me, dancing and saying, ‘It’s going down,’ and making obscene movements. I had to get out of the elevator and now if I see them on the elevator, I need to wait for the next one. Because I cannot be in the same space that they are. And if I try to complain about it, the security and the managers’ answer will be ‘leave them alone, go away,’ and that’s not fair. I cannot leave the facilities [EAC] and be comfortable as I am going to encounter them on the streets. Things like that, you know, it’s very uncomfortable because I ran from my country because of discrimination, and I came here but I am still facing issues with men. That’s personally what triggers me the most about the place [the EAC of residence]. It will be different at least if we are moved to a place where we can be together as a family [group of friends] or where we can be together as women , because we know how to respect others.”

Physical Violence at EACs:

Samantha’s Story: “In one month, I have witnessed at least three fights [in EAC, place of residence] and all of them have been caused by single men. They are the only ones who are causing trouble. They don’t care. They don’t respect anyone. And they absolutely don’t respect women. It’s very difficult for us to be in a place surrounded by so many single guys. I am alone on my floor, so I need to ask my friends whenever they are having food, whenever they are going to take a shower, because I cannot go alone, I need to wait for them so we can go as a group together.”

Fight 1: A fight broke out between a mother who was washing two cycles worth of clothes, and a man behind her in the queue who said it was his turn after one of her cycles.

“And he started yelling to her in a very aggressive way and there was no security in the basement at all. There was one security guy that was near the showers and we called him to please come outside. And he asked, ‘What happened?’ The guy started yelling at the security guard, like, ‘She cannot wash’ and he [the security guard] said, ‘You know, this is not my problem. I was not hired for this. This is not my job.’ He saw the man getting aggressive and violent against a woman and he decided that it was not his job, that it was not his responsibility.”

Fight 2: After waiting for the mother to finish her wash cycle, Samantha and her two female friends remained waiting for their turn to wash their clothes after the group of men had left.

“We were about to put our clothes inside the machine and then all the men arrived to the basement. They tried to disconnect the machines again. They were trying to pass us, then they just started yelling, and they were like this close to us. We were very scared. When I remember it, I start trembling. We were surrounded by six men, and there was only three of us women. So, I started recording the situation with my phone. When they realised that I was recording, they tried to grab my phone. And then they started fighting me directly. There is no manager at night … and all the security guys were mainly young people. The security guards placed themselves between the men and us, … but they [the men] would just go around them and get to us again, you know. They didn’t care. I was very upset because it’s about respecting others, about following the rules. And then the security guard’s response was like, ‘You’re a woman. You should have left. If they are men, you cannot fight them. Why will you say something against them?’ How is that a fair answer? I was waiting for two to three hours, but they are men, you cannot fight them. You know, as a woman, you don’t feel secure. You don’t feel supported by the people that are supposed to give you security. So I think that is one of the biggest issues that we face as women, you know, the lack of security, the lack of support. The children are not being taken care of properly and they are supposed to be.”

Intimidation and Misconduct by Staff at EACs/Threatening to Call the IPAS:

Beatrice’s Story: “They [centre management] say they will call IPAS, and they do that, a lot of times. One time a staff [person] in the hotel came to my room and was yelling in my face. I said, ‘Can you please talk to me with respect? I can hear you, and I can do whatever you want, just tell me what’s wrong and I can fix it.’ She said, ‘I won’t talk to you,’ and she went to a social worker. She said [to the social worker], ‘There is problem with her. I won’t talk to her. Call IPAS or something.’ And at the end of the day, it was nothing. I just put out the buggy for my baby because I was going to pick her up. She said it’s not a good place to put the buggy there, but I didn’t know that. She should tell me, and I would definitely take the buggy to another place. But she was just yelling and humiliating me, and she’s saying, like, ‘You are not thinking. You don’t think about the other residents, and you don’t think.’”

Based on Focus Group Discussion facilitated by AkiDwA in December 2022.