Seán and James Keegan outside their home in Duncormick
DUNCORMICK BROTHERS who must leave the home in which they grew up, just weeks after the passing of their father, have described losing their family home as “like losing our parents all over again.”
Seán and James Keegan of The Lough, Duncormick, explained that, when they went about contacting local service providers to inform them of their father’s death, staff at Wexford County Council told them they had three weeks in which to vacate the council house they had regarded as their home.
The pair are now appealing for leniency to be allowed to continue living in the house, for which they said their father paid €91,000 in rent over the course of 29 years.
“It’s like writing the story of your life on a typewriter and pressing delete,” Seán said, emphasising how he and his brother had found themselves unable to grieve with the stress and uncertainty that the situation had created for them.
While unable to comment on specific cases, Wexford County Council outlined in response to queries that, when the tenant of a local-authority owned house dies and is not deceased by a spouse / partner, ‘the Council will transfer the tenancy into the names of any adult children that have been declared to the Council as residing in the property.’
As Seán explained, however, his brother James had believed his father had declared him as resident in the house but this transpired not to have been the case.
“My brother was living there with him over nine months,” he said.
Seán highlighted how he moved in and out of the house, to which he was brought home from the hospital as a newborn baby and in which he grew up, but that he had intended on moving back in in order “to bring the family back together.”
According to Wexford County Council, however, “in cases where an adult child has not been resident in the property at the time of the death of his / her parent, it is not possible to transfer the tenancy into that person’s name, as to do so would effectively allow them to ‘leapfrog’ to the top of the Council’s housing waiting list.
“There are currently 3,268 on the Council’s housing waiting list.
“It is a requirement of the Council’s tenancy agreement that the names of all persons resident in a local authority rented property are declared to the Council.
“Any income earned by an adult child resident in a local authority rented property is taken into account and assessed for the purpose of calculating the total weekly rent payable.”
Wexford Housing Action Group has pledged its support to the brothers who have stated “we won’t just give up our home without a fight.
“We are asking for any help available… this may be just another house on their books to the Council, but to us it is our home and always will be.”
Read more in the Wexford Echo.