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A chairde,

The Dublin City branch are running a public housing themed doorknocking session tomorrow (Friday) at 18:00 in Ballybough House, Dublin 3. The more people the better so come out and join if you can and you’ll always be paired with someone with more experience if you’d like!

CATU Mountjoy-Dorset are running a picket workshop on Saturday, from 13:00 until 15:00 in the Dublin Adult Learners’ Centre (D01 H426).

This is happening as part of an escalation plan to deal with Vestry Limited Partnerships - a company which is trying to evict families in Dublin 1 into homelessness. Vestry are a major landlord in Ireland, with over 1000 properties and €20million+ in annual profits.

Saturday’s workshop will involve picket planning, some phonebanking and more as we work towards taking the fight to Vestry and securing a win for our members.

Are you new to CATU? Unsure where to start or how a tenant and community union works? Or had you joined a while ago but you're looking to get back involved ahead of our Rent Pressure Zone or Dublin City Council campaigns?

Then this is the event for you!

Your Dublin neighbours are organising a New Members Meeting on Saturday, April 12th, 12:00-13:00, in the Communications Workers’ Union, 575 North Circular Road, D01 TR53.

Here you can ask about how CATU works, learn about your rights as a tenant and how you can empower yourself and your community.

RSVP [email protected] or https://forms.gle/NPD2MPAhgmQoZnPD7

(curious housemates, friends and loved ones also welcome)

The Dublin City Committee will be meeting @1:30 after the New Members Meeting, which attendees are welcome to stick around for.

On Saturday, March 29th, CATU members will be releasing ‘Eviction Nation’, a report that takes an in-depth look at the issues behind the 353 illegal and c.4500 legal evictions recorded in Ireland between 2015 and mid-2024.

These are shocking numbers, but this is likely just the tip of the iceberg.

👉 The report explains why many evictions go unreported, not showing up in any statistics. As a result, the number of actual evictions is likely to be far higher than official figures suggest.

⚖️ The numbers are made more uncertain by the fact that the RTB does not have a stable, clear definition of what constitutes an illegal eviction, leading to inconsistent judgements.

📱While the most violent and sudden illegal evictions, which involve tenants being physically and violently removed from their homes, grab the headlines, the report stresses the need to pay attention to less spectacular evictions.

🔨This includes the widespread and growing use of evictions which are within the law but which nonetheless cause significant harm to tenants and their communities.

✨A launch event will be held at Connolly Books in Dublin at 6pm on the 29th. Refreshments will be provided!

As always, we will have a CATU presence at the upcoming National Demo for Palestine, organised by the IPSC. The meeting point is outside the Mandate offices, just opposite the Gate Theatre in Dublin 1, from 12:45.

CATU will be represented a couple of times this weekend at Marxism 2025, which takes place this year at the Conference Centre, Griffith College, Dublin 8.

On Saturday at 15:30 there’ll be a screening of the Rent Strike documentary, followed by a Q&A with its producer, Fiadh Tubridy.

On Sunday, meanwhile, a couple of our members will participate in a panel discussion on how to build a fighting housing movement - that one kicks off at 17:30.

We’ll also have a stall on the Sunday!

CATU Sligo-Leitrim ran a successful screening of The Rent Strike last Sunday - they were thankful to be joined by Fiadh Tubridy for a discussion after the film, along with local member Brian Lynch and reps from Sligo Housing Action.

If you’d like to run a screening in your local area, get in touch!

Lastly for this week, notice of a couple of upcoming local branch meetings, both of which are happening next Wednesday:

• CATU Rathmines-Ranelagh are meeting at 19:00 in Charlemont Resource Centre (D02 Y993)

• CATU Dún Laoghaire are meeting at 19:30 in Mounttown Community Centre, Fitzgerald Park (A96 KR65).

In Solidarity,

Naoise Faogáin
National Administrator
Community Action Tenants Union - CATU Ireland
www.catuireland.org