{"id":27784,"date":"2025-09-17T21:56:07","date_gmt":"2025-09-17T21:56:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/27784\/"},"modified":"2025-09-17T21:56:07","modified_gmt":"2025-09-17T21:56:07","slug":"a-quirky-take-on-housing-crisis-with-a-snapshot-of-rising-racism-here-the-irish-times","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/27784\/","title":{"rendered":"A quirky take on housing crisis with a snapshot of rising racism here \u2013 The Irish Times"},"content":{"rendered":"

Everyone needs a roof over their head \u2013 but the building of that roof does not necessarily make for riveting television. So you have to credit RT\u00c9<\/a> for coming at the perpetually thorny subjects of soaring property prices<\/a> and the construction crisis<\/a> from a new angle. Several angles in fact \u2013 because Who\u2019s Building Ireland? (RT\u00c9 One, 9.35pm) is at once a quirky look at the building industry and also a bleak snapshot of a country with its feet clagged in a rising swell of racism. <\/p>\n

The going is grim in places. Elkana Mabika is a refugee from Congo<\/a> \u2013 the nexus of one of the most destructive wars of the 21st century, not that you\u2019ll see any hipsters tweeting about it \u2013 and is in Ireland training to be a plumber. Ireland needs plumbers \u2013 along with tradespeople of every description. <\/p>\n

However, Mabika has not encountered much gratitude \u2013 or even simple benign indifference. Instead, he had to negotiate not only a long working day and a punishing commute, but also racism from locals. \u201cThe people from the town are a little bit racist against us,\u201d he says. \u201cMaybe they want us to leave Ireland or something like that.\u201d <\/p>\n

A frosty reception has similarly been reserved for Juan Lopez, who left Colombia<\/a> after guerrillas kidnapped his brother and is working as a carpenter in Dublin. \u201cThey only think immigrants are one type of immigration<\/a>,\u201d the 50-year-old sighs. \u201cWe are paying a lot of taxes. Some people don\u2019t understand.\u201d <\/p>\n

Who\u2019s Building Ireland? is careful not to bite off more than it can handle: it doesn\u2019t drill into the Nimbys\u2019 (Not In My Back Yard) charter that is Irish planning legislation<\/a> or discuss how we have turned Dublin and Cork, in particular, into endless sprawls, rippling ever outward, with no long-term (or even short-term) planning as to how a country of infinite American-style exurbs is supposed to function. <\/p>\n

[\u00a0The Traitors Ireland: That RT\u00c9 is operating on a relative shoe-string budget is obviousOpens in new window<\/a>\u00a0]<\/p>\n

There are some positive stories, too. Crane operator and TikToker Kate Fahey loves her job and is keen to spread awareness about construction as a viable option for young women leaving school. There is a sting in the tail, though. \u201cThe cost of living, never mind trying to find somewhere to live … we\u2019re constantly working now to try and save for a house,\u201d she says. \u201cYou can\u2019t live your life like that. You wish your life away.\u201d<\/p>\n

The biggest personality in the film is Lukas Suska, chief executive of the Roofing Cartel \u2013 a roofing company with a robust social media presence and its own merch line. Suska is great fun, but he draws a contrast between workers from his native Poland<\/a> and those in Ireland. <\/p>\n

\u201cWhen a foreigner comes in here to work, he has a wife, he has a family at home, he cannot be dossing around bringing weed to work, not coming to work on Monday,\u201d he says. \u201cLocal guys do that.\u201d<\/p>\n

He says this with a smile, but his truth bomb is striking. How great it would be if more people in Ireland were prepared to speak honestly and cut through the nonsense that makes day-to-day life here such a struggle. It might help solve the construction crisis: it certainly couldn\u2019t make things any worse. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Everyone needs a roof over their head \u2013 but the building of that roof does not necessarily make…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":27785,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[9151,8044,3662,61,1629,60,43,2850,6085],"class_list":["post-27784","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-ireland","tag-colombia","tag-democratic-republic-of-congo","tag-housing-crisis","tag-ie","tag-immigration","tag-ireland","tag-news","tag-poland","tag-rte"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27784","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=27784"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27784\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/27785"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=27784"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=27784"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=27784"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}