For both Irish and international students at Trinity, housing is a primary source of stress. Rooms — both campus accommodation and otherwise — are hard to find, rented at exorbitant rates, and often come with tenancy and safety concerns. The College and Government must both be held accountable in a situation that is, year by year, becoming increasingly dire.
That paying for accommodation is a major issue for students at Trinity will come to no-one as a surprise. Unaffordable housing is, at this point, practically a tautology. However, with no improvement in sight, the point bears repeating. Campus accommodation costs almost €8,000 for the academic year on average; students living in private third-party student accommodation are paying much more. Surveys over the past few years have found 90 per cent of Trinity students believe college accommodation is unaffordable. 65 per cent report financial difficulties due to rent. The Students’ Union annual housing report is due to be published in the coming weeks; with students still struggling to afford their accommodation, we can hardly expect these numbers to change.
Freezing rent for campus accommodation this academic year is a move in the right direction. Yet just two years ago we saw Trinity increase rents at the maximum legal limit. Oscillating between rent freezes and sharp increases with little prior communication is hardly a reassuring pattern. Students need long-term guarantees and clear communication, not uncertainty over whether they will be able to pay rent next year.
Unaffordability is far from the only issue. As many students struggle to pay for their rooms, others consider themselves lucky just to have found a place. Third-party private accommodations can sell out months before the start of the school year. Trinity Hall, as the college website states, is “always oversubscribed”. The situation can be particularly nerve-wracking for international and visiting students, some of whom must move to Ireland before finding a place to live. While international first-year students were guaranteed rooms in previous years, this is no longer the case. Amidst all the other anxieties that accompany moving to and starting college, it is unacceptable that worrying if you will have a place to live should be one of them.
The problems hardly end if one is able to find a room and pay the rent. Tenancy issues in Trinity accommodation have been raised and variously addressed over the past few years. Most recently, students at Kavanagh Court, with whom Trinity has an exclusive partnership, have reported major safety issues including vandalism, physical assault and racist attacks. Trinity has a responsibility to its students when it offers them a place through agreements with such residences; it must work to ensure security and communication — and though the College has stated this in emails and meetings with residents, there has been little resulting action.
Of course, the fault for these myriad of issues is not all Trinity’s. Lack of sufficient student rooms and other rental properties can more often than not be attributed to government failure: the planned addition of over 300 new beds in Trinity Hall, meant to have been completed in early 2023, is still suspended after the Government failed to provide promised funds. Annual housing targets have continued to be missed, and a recent report from the Department of Finance estimates that the demand driving the current housing crisis may not be resolved until 2040. The Government has failed on housing in general, and in particular it is acting as a bottleneck for colleges in building more campus accommodation and making them affordable. Rise in anti-social behaviour and its inadequate handling are a city-wide issue; on the other hand we also have to look at complacent private student accommodations, who have little incentive to pour additional funding into residences that will sell out anyway.
Finally, however, the College bears responsibility for the part it can do — and there is much more it can. It must commit to and communicate rent freeze plans beyond year-to-year decisions. It must provide housing options for students from abroad, many of whom have no viable alternatives. It must apply pressure to and work actively with third-party accommodation partners to ensure the well-being and safety of its students. Students cannot be expected to focus on their studies as housing becomes an increasing burden; home should be a place of comfort and safety, and for many at the moment it is anything but.
