Ukrainians in Mayo face uncertain future as state-sponsored accommodation winds down

As state sponsored accommodation winds down, Ukrainians in Mayo search for a home, and a war that won’t end.

With state sponsored accommodation centres closing and a housing crisis biting, families who fled the war face an uncertain future in Ireland, while the danger they left behind has not eased.

Fifteen centres in Mayo have contracts ending between October 2026 and January 2027.

This will see 531 Ukrainians living in this county forced to find alternative accommodation.

Natalia has been in Westport for four years. For the past three months, she has spent her evenings messaging landlords.

She shared a house with a couple of other Ukrainian families, seven people in all, and when they began searching together for a four- or five-bedroom home, no landlord would take that many people. The others eventually found places of their own. Now only Natalia’s family is left, and the time before she must leave her current home is running down. Her landlord has decided to sell.

“Some landlords wouldn’t want a child in the house,” she says. “Some prices are not acceptable for us. I can’t afford to pay €2,500 or even €2,000 for my family.” What she can manage, she says, is around €1,200 to €1,500. She has widened her search to as much as 40 kilometres from Westport.

Many of her messages to landlords advertising on Daft go unanswered. “Not all the people want the children in their houses, so they are not telling it directly, but you can figure it out when they say no, and when they keep silent.”

Last weekend alone saw four contracts ending on October 31, including the An File Guest House in Westport, Harbour House Hotel in Killala, the International Hotel in Knock and Valley Lodge in Ballinlough.

Three more end on November 30: The Breaffy Lodges, Mount Falcon Estate Lodges in Ballina and Mulranny Suites.

The largest group follows on January 31, 2027: It includes the Pontoon Bridge Hotel, which has 112 residents, Achill Head Hotel, McWilliam Park Hotel in Claremorris and Kenny’s Guesthouse in Castlebar.

“They say we are taking their houses”

Natalia is acutely aware of Ireland’s housing crisis, and of how some people see Ukrainians in it. She has stopped posting in housing groups on social media. “The Irish people are searching for accommodation for themselves, and they are very aggressive on the internet in relation to Ukrainians,” she says. “They say we are taking their houses and having all the profits for ourselves. That we’re lazy, ignorant.”

Under rental ads on Facebook, she sees comments telling Ukrainians to go back: “That makes me feel that Irish people are kind of annoyed by Ukrainians, but they do not realise the reason why we’re here.”

She stays quiet online, she says, because she doesn’t want to stoke anger or be seen as 'beggars' asking for help: “We are ready to rent privately, and we’re not asking for free housing or for any benefits. We just want to live in peace.”

It is a long way from the welcome she remembers. When she arrived, she says, Irish people were “amazing” and “open-hearted”. “Whenever I came to somebody’s house, I felt at home, as if I were their relative.”

She has given that welcome back. When Hotel Westport housed newly arrived Ukrainians, she volunteered there, and she remains active with the Westport Welcome Ukraine community, helping others in the same position. “We have a good community here in Westport.”

“There are no safe towns at all”

For Natalia, going home is not an option, and she says the past few days have made that plain.

Two days before speaking to The Mayo News, she says, a friend was killed in a missile attack on Kyiv. She was found under the rubble, leaving behind a 20-year-old son. The next day, Natalia’s own town in northern Ukraine was bombed, and two 15-year-old girls were killed.

“People say, go to another town, it’s a huge country, find a safe place,” she says. “There are no safe towns at all.

“We didn’t come here by choice. We came to rescue our kids and to rescue our lives. When there is an opportunity, we’d go back home, because we had a normal life. We had everything: property, cars. We were healthy and wealthy, before the Russians came to take our land, our houses, our lives.”

What she wants now is modest: “I’m happy since my child is happy, and since my child is not hearing the missiles and not hiding in the basements as we used to do in Ukraine.”

Government response

In a statement issued to The Mayo News, the Department of Justice reiterated that the “Government decision of 26 May 2026 provides for the phased withdrawal of State-contracted commercial accommodation for people granted Temporary Protection who arrived in Ireland before 14 March 2024.”

Ireland, it says,” remains committed to supporting people displaced by the war in Ukraine. Temporary Protection remains in place until March 2028 and these accommodation changes do not affect an individual's Temporary Protection status or their associated rights and entitlements.”

As for the next steps, the Department explains that residents affected by these changes have been provided with advance notice to allow time to make alternative accommodation arrangements. Recognising that this represents a significant change for residents, the Department of Justice, Home Affairs and Migration, working with the Irish Red Cross (IRC) and the International Organisation for Migration (IOM), has undertaken extensive engagement with affected residents. Information and practical supports have been made available to assist residents in understanding their options and planning for the future, including supports aimed at facilitating independent living where appropriate.

For those who applied to continue accommodation support from the State, the Department states that the "process of assessing applications against the published criteria remains ongoing and is expected to continue for a number of weeks. People assessed as continuing to require State-contracted accommodation are being offered ongoing accommodation.”

The phased withdrawal of some commercial accommodation is being implemented on a region-by-region basis. These providers will receive notice of termination in due course, if they have not yet already. A list of all properties whose contracts are being terminated is available on gov.ie. This list is being updated as soon as the termination notices issue to the providers.

The Department continues to engage with relevant Departments and agencies regarding the implementation of these arrangements and any wider impacts that may arise, including potential pressures on housing and homelessness services.

Information on available supports and services has been provided to assist affected individuals during this transition. Further information on accommodation supports for people with Temporary Protection is available at Ukraine Updates (EN).