Most people living in Dublin's Fatima Mansions feel ashamed or embarrassed about where they live and want to see the flats completely or partially demolished, according to a new report.
Making Fatima a Better Place to Live paints a picture of families who are prisoners in their own homes because drug-dealers have taken over the local authority flats beside St James's Hospital.
Yet, writes the report's author, Dr Mary Corcoran, "alongside the simmering despair at the level of degradation into which the estate has fallen there is a strong sense of an enduring social fabric and strong social networks which one would be hard-pressed to find on many private suburban estates". More than half the families in Fatima Mansions have lived there for 10 years or more.
But the report makes clear that, despite the strong sense of community in individual blocks, many families are desperate to get out. However, they are frustrated at what they see as an irrational points system which means they will have their children reared before they accumulate enough points to get out of a house.
The report was launched yesterday by the President, Mrs McAleese.
"Daily life in Fatima Mansions is a feat of endurance," says the report, written for Fatima Groups United, which represents local community bodies.
"The most common motif employed by residents to characterise their daily lives is that of imprisonment. They are literally `doing time'."
The lives of some residents are dominated by attempts to get extra housing points to help them get out of Fatima, it says. The main forces making people want to get out are the drugs problem, what they see as poor upkeep of the flats by Dublin Corporation and some children who, along with the drug-pushers, have made the public areas of the flats a no-go area for other children.
"People in Fatima are in a constant state of waiting: waiting on maintenance services to improve the quality of their present life, waiting to achieve the required number of points to get out of Fat ima and into a house, waiting for the opportunity to wipe the slate clean and start over somewhere else," says the report.
Those surveyed on improving the future of Fatima Mansions called for the demolition of some or all of the existing flats and a redesign of the complex.
They also called for an improved maintenance service from Dublin Corporation, measures to encourage children to get an education and a more effective policing strategy to tackle the drug-dealers, including blanket policing and more undercover policing.
The report recommends that individual blocks elect representatives who would be paid to liaise with the corporation and other bodies. Dublin Corporation housing officials should have a higher visibility in the complex, and safe play areas that are able to be supervised should be provided for children.
Yesterday's visit by the President was seen by Fatima Groups United as a new starting point, according to its acting chairman, Mr Derek Farrell.
"We see this event not as an end in itself but as a firm launching pad into a very important part of a new wider process," he said.
He said he hoped a consensus could be reached on the way forward.