Bacik calls out Baggot Street Hospital sale

Labour leader and Deputy for Dublin Bay South Ivana Bacik has called out Government for failing to use the iconic Baggot Street Hospital building to provide much needed homes for people.

Deputy Bacik said:

“It is deeply disappointing to see that the iconic Baggot Street hospital building will not now be used to provide homes, with reports indicating that the building has been sold to a hotelier.

“I and my Labour colleague Cllr Dermot Lacey have been pushing Government for years now to get the state to take over the building and repurpose it for providing accommodation – for healthcare workers for example.

“The Land Development Agency should have been involved in this. Instead we see a commercial sale announced on the private market. Once again the government has failed in the provision of homes- in the midst of a housing emergency when there are so many HSE and other state owned properties lying idle, vacant or even derelict.

“Families are struggling to find a secure place to live, children are growing up in emergency accommodation, and workers on decent wages are being locked out of home ownership altogether. Every week my office hears from people who are losing hope in the face of spiralling rents, shrinking supply and a system that seems designed to benefit institutional investors rather than ordinary households. The sale of the iconic Baggot Street Hospital is emblematic of a wider pattern across the State which highlights the failure of this Government to provide due regard to the common good.”