Carlo’s Takeaway, in the Greenhills shopping centre, has launched the ‘Cheers for the Chips’ project which allows customers to pay for a bag of chips for someone in need to avail of at a later time.
A sign in the chipper reads: “There is goodness present when good deeds happen, and no one is watching. #CheersForTheChips.”
Liberty Soup Run shared the initiative on their social media, calling it a “brilliant idea”. Carlo’s Takeaway also donated 10 pizzas to the soup run in recent days for distribution to the homeless.
Protest held at Dublin City hall after plans on banning on-street services
The initiative comes at a time when on-street soup kitchens in Dublin are under potential threat.
Bylaws to be drafted by Dublin City Council could end up restricting volunteer groups from providing on-street hot meals to the city’s homeless.
An independent report commissioned three years ago found a need to take “immediate action to address the risks associated with on-street services” as they subject vulnerable people to “undignified” and “unsafe conditions”.
The report also linked on-street soup kitchens to anti-social behaviour and recommended they be moved indoors or to alternative locations.
Part of the report states that the high-profile locations where these services are being provided “risk the privacy, dignity and safety of people using the service”.
This report was commissioned by the Taoiseach’s Taskforce for Dublin, who proposed restricting the soup kitchens last October.
The announcement has sparked a significant backlash, particularly from those involved in providing these services. Some of them argue that without their aid, homeless people’s lives could be put at risk.
Focus Ireland has also said the solution lies in working “more closely with the providers”, rather than restricting them.
The homelessness crisis in Ireland remains precarious, with 15,199 people in emergency accommodation at the end of November 2024.
This is the highest number of people accessing emergency accommodation on record in Ireland.
These figures also include 4,658 children and do not account for those sleeping rough, in domestic abuse refuges, couch-surfing, or in other forms of homelessness.
