€64m for housing needs in Carlow-Kilkenny

A total of €64 million has been delivered by the Government to meet housing needs in Carlow-Kilkenny, Minister of State Ann Phelan told the Dáil. “That is unprecedented,” she said. “ It was never heard of previously across the constituency. I know it will be put to extremely good use in the housing of people who are in need of social housing. Such money was never provided by a previous Government that I can remember.”

Opposing a Fianna Fáil motion on social housing, she said that under the Government’s Social Housing Strategy, an investment of €4 billion to 2020 is envisaged nationally. Almost €3 billion of this has been committed under this Government's capital plan, Building on Recovery: Infrastructure and Capital Investment 2016–2021.

“Funding is now approved and sites are selected for the construction of over 5,000 new social homes in the coming years,” she said. “The social housing output report for 2015 outlines many of the achievements that were delivered in support of the Government's programme. Exchequer funding for social housing in 2015 was over €800 million, representing an increase of €210 million over 2014. In 2015, Exchequer funding for homelessness services was €64.77 million, representing a 32% increase on the amount provided in 2014.”

Funding has been approved and sites have been selected for the construction of over 5,000 new social units, she said. Over 1,000 properties were acquired by local authorities for social housing use in 2015. Some 420 staff were recruited by local authorities to deliver more social housing units as quickly as possible. Over 13,000 new social housing unit sets of keys were delivered in 2015. There was an 86% increase in unit delivery above the figure for 2014.

Some 2,700 vacant social housing units were brought back into use under an intensive programme of works funded by the Exchequer, she continued. “Approval of the first 500 units of a new PPP, which will deliver over 1,500 units, was announced in 2015. Almost 9,000 social housing units were delivered through social housing leasing, the RAS and the HAP scheme. The latter is now operational in 18 local authority areas. NAMA delivered 2,000 units for social housing by the end of 2015.”

“A further 249 properties are considered to be active transactions where terms are agreed or active negotiation is ongoing by all parties concerned and where a detailed appraisal is being carried out,” she said. “An additional 341 properties are to be further appraised. Overall, I expect that, at least, in excess of 2,200 units for social housing purposes will be secured from this engagement with NAMA. By the end of December 2015, NAMA had identified a total of 6,634 properties as being potentially available for social housing. Over the last number of years, local authorities and the Housing Agency have been working systematically through these units with NAMA to determine if there is a social housing demand for the properties identified.”

The Minister of State said there are a number of reasons why local authorities may determine that units identified by NAMA are not suitable. A small number of units were declined on the basis that they were not suitable for social housing either by virtue of the nature of the development, for example, they were holiday-type developments, the units were in areas of exceptionally high market rents or they required high management services charges and were therefore not viable.

The Fianna Fáil motion was defeated by 63 votes to 27.