Focus Ireland launched a hard-hitting new campaign which aims to boost the charity's drive to raise funds vital to ensure its services can cope with the growing demand from people who are homeless as the winter nights close in.

Focus Ireland parked an admobile outside the gates of Government Buildings featuring a poster showing a man sleeping in his car with the headline: "I used to build homes. Then I lost mine."

Focus Ireland CEO Joyce Loughnan said: "This poignant poster captures the reality that some of the construction workers who built thousands of homes during the boom actually lost their own homes when they lost their jobs as the recession hit the country."

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Focus Ireland said there are also many thousands of families and single people nationwide who are struggling to keep a roof over their heads and are at risk of losing their homes.

Ms Loughnan said: "It's sadly ironic that despite the thousands of surplus houses that were built in recent years up to 5,000 people are still homeless due to the lack of social housing."

Focus Ireland said the charity has seen an increase in the number of people coming looking for support who are homeless as they lost their jobs due to the recession.

Ms Loughnan said: "There are men coming in to our Coffee Shop who last year or the year before were working on building sites but then lost their jobs and got in to debt. They could no longer pay the rent and lost their apartment or flat and some ended up homeless. We are trying to help them to secure a home again and escape from being homeless. They are proud people and can find it very hard being homeless or asking for support."

(CD)