He was hospitalised after authorities removed his tent from near a Dublin canal while he was sleeping inside it.
ADVERTISEMENTIreland's housing crisis has become a key election issue after a homeless man was seriously injured when his tent was being cleared in Dublin city centre.
He was sleeping inside on Tuesday when it was taken away to clear a canal towpath, a spokesperson for local police told Euronews.
The individual remains in a serious but stable condition in hospital, police said.
The incident happened on the first day of campaigning after the Taoiseach (Irish Prime Minister) Leo Varadkar sparked an election for Saturday, February 8.
Eoghan Murphy, the Irish Housing Minister, became a trending topic in Ireland, with photos circulating on Twitter showing his campaign poster near the incident, as seen above.
Murphy, a Fine Gael politician and member of Leo Varadkar's cabinet, took to Twitter, saying that he was "saddened to hear of the incident by the canal," adding that his campaign poster had been removed from the scene.
Meanwhile, both Murphy and the Lord Mayor of Dublin called for a full report from Irish police.
Opposition politicians and others pointed to the incident as being part of a wider crisis in relation to housing both in the capital and across the country.
Green Party candidate Neasa Hourigan called it "awful," saying that "surely we can do better than this".
The Inner City Helping Homeless (ICHH) charity called for answers via social media.
According to the charity Focus Ireland, there were nearly 10,500 people homeless across Ireland in the week of November 18th to 24th 2019, with the number of homeless families increasing by over 300% since November 2014.
Click on the player above as Seana Davis in The Cube details more.