Dáil Éireann Debate, Wednesday - 24 October 2018
66. Deputy Joan Burton asked the Minister for Public Expenditure and Reform the specific use to which the €400 million proceeds from the sale of Bord Gáis have been put; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [43832/18]
View answerI assume that the Deputy is referring to the €400m of proceeds from the sale of Bord Gáis Energy that the Government announced, in Budget 2015, would be made available to support the Government's Social Housing Strategy.
As the Deputy will be aware, the intention when Bord Gáis Energy was sold was that €400m from the proceeds would be made available to establish an off-balance sheet financial vehicle to provide financing to Approved Housing Bodies. This funding, together with additional private funding, would then facilitate the provision of additional housing units by the AHB sector, in support of the Government's Social Housing Strategy.
The Government established a Clearing House Group, under the Department of Housing Planning and Local Government, to work with the sector with a view to developing a new model that could use the €400m in this way. Unfortunately, however, it proved very challenging to find a model that would be capable of using the funding while remaining off-balance sheet in Eurostat terms.
However, the Clearing House Group considered that there were aspects of some of the proposals considered that appeared to offer potential, in terms of the possible development of a new ‘affordable rental’ initiative. This would seek to provide long-term affordable residential accommodation for low to moderate income key-worker households in urban areas of high demand.
In response to this outcome, it was decided to convert the commitment from a single lump sum payment to fund the initial capital cost of social housing provision, into a commitment to provide €10m per annum, indexed for inflation, over a much longer period – at least 20 years. This ongoing funding could then be used to fund a pilot scheme for the provision of subsidised housing, thus making the housing available on an affordable basis over a 20 year period.
This additional €10 million in annual funding was allocated to the Vote of the Department of Housing Planning and Local Government from 2017 onwards. In addition, this commitment to increased funding for social and affordable housing has been subsumed into a much more significant commitment to increased support for the programmes of the Department of Housing, Planning and Local Government in the area of housing - as reflected both in the National Development Plan 2018-2027 published in February 2018 and also the further €266 million in additional capital funding allocated for this purpose over 2019-2021 in Budget 2019.
