CATU News – Week 42
A spectre is haunting landlords: The spectre of organised communities! With that in mind, plans are afoot for a Halloween themed Week of Action on housing and the cost of living.
Branches and groups across the island will be running events – and you can too! Potential local actions can include:
– Community Action: Do a protest in an area with visibility and lots of local footfall, have demands and signs.
– Direct Action: organise a sit in/occupations against a target (landlord, letting agents, companies, council)
– Creative/Visual Protests (Halloween themed) – Stall or smaller local action to raise awareness of issues and the union – Trainings or other events to skill up members and build community
Events that are due to take place include:
A stall in Maynooth (Oct 29th)
A stall and social in Wexford/South Wicklow (Oct 29th)
A standards and affordable development campaign meeting in Mountjoy-Dorset (Oct 27th)
An empty homes ghost tour in Phibsboro-Glasnevin (Oct 29th)
A Halloween social in Cabra (Oct 27th)A Council focused action in Ballymun-Finglas (Oct 25th)
A recruitment and doorknocking training in Inchicore-Kilmainham (Oct 24th)
A stall and doorknocking session in Westmeath (date TBC)
A doorknocking session in Dundalk (Oct 29th)
If you’re interested in either putting together an event in your local area and would like some support in doing so – or you’d like to know more about any of the above events – drop me a message. We’ll have more details in next week’s newsletter on confirmed events and times etc.
For Phibsboro-Glasnevin’s ghost tour on the 29th, the branch have put together a Google Form to (a) gauge the level of interest in attending and (b) to gather suggestions on vacant properties to include in the tour. You can contribute to that HERE. The branch are also planning for a bigger action in December, so if you can’t make it this time around, there’ll be details coming on that soon.
For Inchicore-Kilmainham’s event, all are welcome to a skillshare focused on how to knock on doors and talk to neighbors, friends and the wider community about housing issues and our union, next Monday, October 24th at 6pm. This will take place in Bosco Youth Centre opposite Drimnagh Luas stop. Google maps link HERE.
The event is open to all members, but especially relevant if:
– You have never knocked doors or spoken to people about CATU before, are a new member or if you haven’t had a chance to get active yet.
– If you are an experienced doorknocker who wants a refresher or who can share tips, good things and insights from your experience.
The basics of knocking doors and talking about the union will be covered along with sharing tips, tricks and experiences. There will then be an hour long doorknocking session in Inchicore, supported by one of the union’s Leinster Organisers.
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There’s now one day left to apply for the Ulster Organiser role!
Further details, including the job spec and application form, can be found HERE.
The role is part-time at 80 hours a month, with a rate of pay of £13/€15 per hour, and the deadline is midnight tomorrow (Friday). Completed application forms and CVs should be sent to jobs@catuireland.org
You can also run any questions you might have about the role by me and I’ll be make sure to get back to you in time for the deadline.
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Introducing the CATU Dues Portal!
The process of managing your membership – from fixing a lapsed payment to updating your card details to cancelling – has been overly complicated and is something we’ve been trying to address. We now have a Dues Portal in which you can self-manage all of these things in a way that’s much better integrated than before.
I’ll have a separate, standalone email on this going out in the coming days, but for now, if you’d like to check the portal out you can do so HERE. It should be easy to navigate but if you have any questions please let me know.
We would particularly encourage anyone with a lapsed membership to access the portal and renew if you can.
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Are you a new CATU member? Or have you been around a while and looking for a refresh on the fundamentals of the union? There will be a new members’ training session happening on Thursday, November 10th on Zoom, facilitated by our Training Coordinator, Aisling. If you’d be interested in taking part, drop me a line and we’ll get you signed up.
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CATU Cork are hosting their branch AGM TONIGHT at 7pm in UCC’s West Wing room 9, courtesy of University College Cork Student Union. All members are encouraged to attend and vote on and/or run for the positions in the branch committee.
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Congratulations to CATU Ballymun-Finglas, whose relentless organising efforts in recent months are really bearing fruit. A third public meeting in as many weeks has seen a huge uptake in membership across the local community, with new members taking on the mantle of organising and running meetings. Their upcoming action on October 25th, targeting Dublin City Council’s ineptitude in dealing with standards and maintenance issues, will keep the momentum going with a view to further escalations.
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CATU Dún Laoghaire members were out in force last Friday to prevent the eviction of two members from their family home. They’ll be ready and waiting to return to their members’ aid if their landlord tries to follow through on the eviction with just as big a response.
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Lastly for this week – do you have experience with transcribing/captioning? Or is it something you’d be interested in? CATU’s oral history research group is looking to transcribe its series of recorded interviews and will need as much help as possible in getting them done. If you’d be up for helping out, let me know.
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That’s all for now – all contributions and feedback are welcome as always <3
In solidarity,
Naoise Faogáin
National Administrator
Community Action Tenants Union – CATU Ireland
www.catuireland.org