The heady scent of incense snakes its way through the corridors of the Salthill Handball Club in west Galway, casting a spell on yoga practitioners inside.
In a small, candlelit room on the top floor, the chanting of Tibetan monks mingles with the gentle instruction of yoga teacher Aisling Battersby as she guides her class through breathing techniques, body poses and meditation. The cutthroat world of politics could not be further away.
Yet, when all the candles are blown out and the yoga mats are safely stowed away, the conversation quickly turns to the coming election.
Salthill is one of Galway’s most affluent neighbourhoods. But even against a backdrop of leafy suburban cul-de-sacs and sea-view properties, the housing crisis is present.
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“I work in one of the big biomedical companies and it has jumped out at me in the last few months that the people I am working with, people in their 30s and 40s, graduates with well-paid jobs, senior engineers, are all living with their parents, saving money to build houses,” says Salthill native John Donnolly.
“The stress for those people and their families, these multigenerational families, is a big issue. This didn’t hit my generation. We were fortunate enough, 25 years ago, to be able to move out, rent, and then buy our house. That’s not the case any more. Their lives are going to be different from the lives that my generation have been able to lead.”
Asked which political party is best positioned to tackle the housing crisis, he replies: “I don’t think any of them are up for it ... I don’t think any of the parties can handle it. They can all do about the same.”
Galway woman Saibh Egan has been practising yoga at the Salthill centre for years. She says the classes give her a pain-free body, peace of mind, and the chance to “turn off” the wider world for a time.
When she turns the world back “on” again, her first thoughts are with the people in the direct provision system where she works.
“At the end of the day, this comes down to looking after people. We have enough room and money in this country to look after everybody. But it all comes back to housing,” she says.
“If we don’t have enough housing, it is the people who have arrived here most recently who will feel the real brunt end of it. They are the ones who are ending up having to live in hotels and hostels.
“When I say ‘direct provision’, what I am talking about is hundreds and hundreds of children. The words ‘direct provision’ often bring a different image to people, but we are talking about children, living out their youth in cramped hotel bedrooms with very little access to outdoor spaces.
“This has been the defining problem of the current government and they have shown that they can’t do anything about it. I have no idea who could, but maybe giving a new government a try is not a bad idea.”
A practising psychotherapist, Battersby has been teaching yoga and running yoga teacher-training courses through her company, Optimum Health, for the past 20 years.
As a small business owner, working in several fields which are vulnerable during a recession, she has concerns over the current direction of the country.
“There is always fear as a small business owner, always. I don’t have a lot of faith in the Government. There is a lot of money in the country and I don’t know why the housing crisis is still so bad. How did they get it so wrong?” she says.
“The Government pays a lot of money to economists each year and they don’t seem to be taking their advice ...
“I think that we are voting out of a sense of fear. We are afraid to step outside the box and change. We have had our freedom as a country for 100 years. I think we could all start to think differently and more deeply about who we are voting for and why.”
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