A move away from local authority house construction has pushed an increasing number of children into homelessness, according to the Ombudsman for Children.
Dr Niall Muldoon said numerous governments must take responsibility for what he described as a "traumatic breach" of the rights of children and young people, who have spent their formative years in emergency accommodation.
Mr Muldoon was speaking at the official opening of Houben House, a family hub run by The Salvation Army in Dublin, which accommodates 350 parents and children.
It is the country's largest family homeless hub which has been housing people since in 2020. The official opening was delayed until today due to the Covid pandemic.
Andra Calauz, her husband and seven children have lived at Houben House for four years when they could no longer remain in private accommodation.
Despite the tight squeeze, Andra keeps life as normal as possible for her children, the youngest is just six months old.
The children are happy she says because they are in school and there are activities at the hub to keep them occupied.
There is also a large courtyard which doubles up as a play area for all the children who live at the facility.
The greatest difficulty Andra faces is getting downstairs to cook for the children.
"I need to take everything downstairs for cooking," she says, "it's hard with seven children, cooking downstairs".
Andra is originally from Romania and has lived in Ireland for over ten years.
Her husband came to work here and she followed him "for love", and they rented private accommodation.
"I got complaints because I was cleaning and hoovering at night. It was the only time I had to do these things, when the children were in bed, so we were told we had to leave."
The Calauz family is one of 62 families at the hub, 17 are Irish and 45 are from countries including Somalia, Romania, Germany, and South Africa.
Spanning across four floors, the hub includes 62 rooms, a library, sensory playroom, kitchens, laundry rooms, a dining room and outdoor courtyard which is also a play area.
On their arrival, families are met and supported by key workers.
Employment, housing workshops and programmes are provided to help people to move towards long-term independent living.
The vision of the Salvation Army, according to Houben House's Service Manager Anthony Byrne, is that no child or family in Ireland presents as homeless.
However, he said Ireland is veering "further away from that vision every day".
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With the support of Dublin City Council, the charity has helped 158 families move into new homes.
"Most of the families that come to us have experienced homelessness due to the cost-of-living and a lack of social and affordable housing," Mr Byrne says.
"It is a circumstance that any of us here today could find ourselves facing."
The Salvation Army has implemented a 10 year homeless services strategy, with a 'trauma informed' approach to build safety and trust and restore residents’ confidence.
Dr Niall Muldoon has said the fact Houban House is at full capacity showed that the State had failed to live up to its promise from 2017, to prevent the use of any emergency accommodation by 2018, except in very exceptional cases.
"The move away from local authority housing during the economic crash has led to a situation now where we are consistently failing more and more children and families who are falling, rarely due to any fault of theirs, into economic homelessness.
"That is a most traumatic breach of children's rights and something for which numerous different governments must take responsibility," he says.
Homeless figures for June showed that 14,303 individuals were accessing emergency accommodation, including 2,093 families and 4,404 children.
