Winnie Keenan lives in a caravan in Cappagh, Co Dublin, with no electricity. Three of the windows are broken: one of them has no frame or glass and is boarded up. There is a hole in the floor through to the outside, and part of the front door frame is missing.
"A man to do with the electricity came around and said there was no way electricity could come in because it could cause a fire," she says.
Despite the fact that Fingal County Council wants to lift Winnie's caravan into a nearby temporary halting site with facilities for hot showers, toilets and places to park the caravans, she doesn't want to go.
She and other family members who live in two caravans close by have refused to move into the new halting site. They say their caravans are not fit to move. They say they are afraid they will fall apart if the council lifts them with a crane. They also say they do not trust the council to provide better caravans if they move onto the halting site.
"I'm not moving out of here until I can get something I can relax in without the wind coming in," says Winnie.
Other Traveller families who had been living near the Keenans moved on to the new halting site last week.
Mr Padraig O Mordha, administration officer in the Traveller section of Fingal County Council, says he cannot understand why some Travellers do not want to move to the new halting site, given the facilities it offers. "They are holding us up to blackmail. We offered to move them and they told us to eff off . . . The Travellers are being ungrateful," he said.
For the last week Winnie and her seven children have been staying with relatives at night, as she says the caravan is not safe. The council turned off the water supply to the area where the Keenan families live last Wednesday when it tried to move them. They now walk to the new halting site and carry water back in containers.
Most of Winnie's family are in similar circumstances as herself.
Her sister-in-law, Kathleen Keenan, lives in a caravan which has sheets of plastic covering the large rear window as the glass and frame are broken. There is a 2 sq ft hole in the middle of the floor which is boarded up with wood. One section of the inside caravan wall is not secured and is falling off. The wall around the gas cooker is black from the flames, and the electricity flickers on and off.
Sheila Keenan, Winnie's mother-in-law, lives in a caravan where only one window has a latch. All others are open or tied. The caravan also has a hole in the floor.
Sheila shows a note from her doctor in Blanchardstown saying she is unwell and is on medication for asthma and high blood pressure and "urgently needs a new caravan".
The family say they would like to go to the new site but would not do so without better caravans. "It's a lovely site and I'd love to go to it but I can't. I'm not saying I want something brand-new. All I want is a safe home for my children," Winnie says.
"It's not like they'll be giving us the caravan for nothing. We will have to pay it back over time," she adds.
Mr O Mordha says Travellers who want new caravans have to apply through a home-loan scheme whereby they would be assessed as to whether they needed a new caravan and whether they would be able to pay back the loan. He says the cost of the scheme is being assessed.
But the Keenan family say they applied for better caravans 1 1/2 years ago and have not been promised them.
Ms Ronnie Fay, director of Pavee Point and a member of the Local Traveller Accommodation Consultative Committee for Finglas, says the council has been telling her since August that an independent assessor would visit the caravans. Yesterday afternoon an assessment was carried out on the caravans, she says.
"Irish Lives" will appear in The Irish Times each Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday and Friday until Christmas