The development of publicly owned residential lands for social and affordable housing is a top priority for this Government. In this context, together with developing a significant build programme on their existing residential land bank, local authorities are also required to consider the availability of land for housing, particularly social and affordable housing, within their area of responsibility.
Given the priority of the strategic development of the local authority land bank, all local authority residential sites were mapped on the Rebuilding Ireland land map, which is available at the following link on the Rebuilding Ireland website, http://rebuildingireland.ie/news/rebuilding-ireland-land-map/. The map includes details of over 700 local authority and Housing Agency owned sites amounting to some 1,700 hectares, and local authorities have been requested to update the map on a quarterly basis.
€2.4 billion is being provided for housing in 2019 and all local authorities are encouraged to bring forward viable and appropriate development proposals, which can be funded through the range of schemes and programmes that have been put in place. For example, as part of Budget 2019, the Government announced €310 million, under the Serviced Sites Fund (SSF), for enabling infrastructure on Council lands to facilitate affordable housing. The first call issued to local authorities in June and further calls will be made in the weeks and months ahead.
In terms of providing housing support to the most vulnerable, a strong and growing social housing construction pipeline is now in place, as evidenced in the Quarter 2 2018 Social Housing Construction Status Report. Since the end of 2016, the number of schemes and homes in the programme has doubled. Activity on-site has also increased significantly, with 1,074 homes going on-site in Q2 this year alone. The Q2 2018 Report is available at the following link: http://rebuildingireland.ie/news/minister-murphy-publishes-latest-social-housing-construction-report/.
In order to assist local authorities further my Department hosted a workshop last week to discuss strategic land development and the delivery of affordable housing. Further bilateral engagement between local authorities and my Department will now follow with a view to progressing further social and affordable projects on council lands.
While the development of existing local authority sites is the priority, where a local authority identifies a need to acquire additional lands, it may seek to borrow the required finance from the Housing Finance Agency. Once the site is included within the social housing construction programme my Department would then normally consider recouping the land costs and any associated loan interest charges to the local authority, as part of the social housing project approval process.
In accordance with Section 106 of the Local Government Act 2001, as amended, the decision to borrow is a reserved function of the elected members of the local authority concerned, who have direct responsibility in law for all reserved functions and are accountable for all expenditure by the local authority. As such, it is a matter for each local authority to determine its own spending priorities in the context of the annual budgetary process, having regard to both locally identified needs and available resources.
Section 106 of the Act also provides that local authorities must obtain the consent of the appropriate Minister to undertake borrowing. In this regard, sanction to borrow for housing land acquisition is submitted by the local authority to my Department, and sanction may be granted based on an assessment of the financial viability of potential loans insofar as individual local authorities are concerned, and an assessment as to whether the borrowing can be accommodated within the context of the fiscal rules.
