“What is it about the way Ireland's economy and society are set up that a 'good job' leaves me in fuel poverty?”

Blog by Colm, a private rental tenant, on his experience of living in a “subterranean icebox” of a basement apartment in Dublin. In this powerful testimony, Colm shares how he was essentially forced to choose between heating his gaff and saving up for a Master’s degree and a house deposit. Colm’s story points to the stark reality faced by scores of tenants in Ireland—of being forced to live in unhealthy, substandard homes whilst also being left with no agency whatsoever to do even basic insulation or heating system upgrades. That is why, through our ‘Warm Homes for All: Tenants for Climate Justice’ campaign, we’re calling on the Government for tailor-made retrofitting solutions for the rental sector. 

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It is late March and I have a date at the weekend. This is a new person and I want to impress them, so I am making the effort to clean the place up. Part of that involves banishing the mould from the walls and ceiling of my apartment, a dim, cold and slimy basement affair I share with my dear housemate. 

As I scrub, using a mould remover and a moderate amount of soapy water, the lights outside begin to flicker. I try to turn them off, wincing as my arm jerks back involuntarily, and finish the job quickly. The inside lights will not turn off, so I cut the power at the fusebox. An electrician is dispatched. I tell my friends I am lucky to have a good landlord. In general, most problems in this subterranean icebox are dealt with reasonably quickly. Don't lose sympathy for me though - the date was luckless, so perhaps I could have left the mould undisturbed.

For my centrally located double bedroom, I pay €849, without bills. This is another reason I consider myself lucky - although I know this is extortionate when I think of what my friends in other cities and other countries pay for what they get, I am acutely aware that I could be paying more for less. 

We try to keep the place dry - cooking and boiling the kettle are done with an open window and the extractor fan on, showering is done at the gym (free with work and college), and my family's dehumidifier is on constantly. It has a useful feature where it turns on when the air is above a certain level of humidity and is otherwise off, which keeps electricity costs down. 

We do not turn the heating on, in general. Electricity costs are high and with the gaff being underground and seemingly uninsulated, heat tends to bleed into the walls in a matter of minutes, making the whole thing distinctly unrewarding and uneconomical. I heat my bedroom when I have visitors and otherwise I stay very late at the office and shelter in place under my duvet.

Mould makes you sick. It causes or makes worse respiratory conditions such as the common cold and asthma, and negatively impacts your overall physical and mental health. This makes it more likely that people who live in accommodation like mine will need to take sick leave, with the associated financial costs of recuperation and potentially foregoing pay. Ireland lacks specific laws addressing mould in rental housing, and as such it is common for landlords to shunt blame on to tenants. My landlord acknowledged that the mould would be there no matter what I did and instructed me to leave the dehumidifier on to 'manage' it.

A quick search online yields a publication which tells me I earn very slightly above the median income in Ireland, and that this income bracket should leave me "strained in central Dublin without shared housing." One could argue that choosing not to heat my home is a choice, and indeed it is - I am choosing instead to save for education (a Master's fee in a relevant field will set me back around €9,000 here in Ireland, not including living costs), and a deposit for a house. A deposit for a house in my native Cork will cost me ~€35,000, more than my take-home pay for the entire year. I have a 'good job', a job that most would consider puts me in a position of privilege. 

What is it about the way Ireland's economy and society are set up at the moment that a 'good job' leaves me in fuel poverty? 

In January, I arrived home after a fortnight away to find a forest of white-green tendrils growing out of the wooden chopping block I had left on the drying rack. A bug wandering over into the mould patch would have been lost for days. In general, despite ongoing sterilisation efforts, I continue to find mould in my kitchen on an almost weekly basis. 

If I do leave the country (and the outward march of the twenty-somethings is already happening all around me), the freezing dampness of Irish housing will be a major driving factor. 

Until then, in an effort to help make the country better, I've joined CATU. You should too. 

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Note: Colm has fortunately been able to move to a better home since writing this blog.