THE PROPORTION of people calling the Society of St Vincent de Paul for help for the first time increased from about 20 per cent of all calls to almost 30 per cent in the second half of last year.
A spokesman said the charity was so inundated with calls for help that it was increasingly unable to carry out home visits or its social-care work.
The situation was worst in Cork, he said, where the proportion of calls from people who were seeking help for the first time reached 34 per cent by the end of November.
Nationally the proportion was rising “all the time”.
In total the number of calls for help to the Dublin offices increased from 14,737 in the second half of 2007 to 17,636 last year.
“In terms of percentage increases it is very, very serious,” said the spokesman. He said the issue was being exacerbated by delays in getting social welfare applications processed.
In June last year the proportion of all calls nationally for help, from people calling for the first time was 22 per cent.
“By August it was 23 per cent. In September it was 27 per cent. In October it was 28 per cent and by the end of November it was 29 per cent. It is likely the figure was even higher in December.”
Of all the calls between June and November, he said, 32 per cent were from people needing an immediate home visit, 25 per cent were from people needing food vouchers, 17 per cent were from people needing help paying for gas, electricity or oil while 12 per cent were from people “struggling to manage”.
He said a senior volunteer had recently said to him that with the enormous volume of calls from people needing immediate financial assistance there was “less and less time to do the social visits” and there was a sense that the society was operating as “an extension of the Department of Social and Family Affairs”.
He said people were calling “in very deep distress” and the majority of calls were from households with children.
“We are spending €1 million a week and expect to spend €60 million this year. We don’t know what is going to happen or where it is going to stop.
“It is manic at the moment and the only indications are that it is going to get worse,” he added.
