Dublin City Council has unanimously voted to introduce more safe houses for victims of domestic violence.
Sinn Fein's Noeleen Reilly brought this motion to council saying families looking for emergency accommodation are being turned away because there are no free places.
She said last year, Women's Aid made 513 referrals to refuges but 137 of them said they were full and had nothing available.
Noeleen says women and their families are finding it hard to find somewhere safe because of the housing crisis:
"When people are at their most vunerable, they're being made more vunerable. DCC needs to write to the Minister to ensure that there is adequate funding available to provide people with emergency accommodation. We need to ensure there's adequate places in refuges so no woman is forced to return home".
Noeleen's colleague Chris Andrews said he tried to help someone recently.
"There was actually little the council could offer her by way of services, the resources and structures weren't in place to assist this family deal with the situation they were in".
The proposal will now go to the council's Housing Strategic Policy Committee who will look at it further.
