Before we adjourned I was referring briefly to the Kenny Committee which has recently been set up to inquire into building land prices. I wish to refer to it in passing as an indication of the Government's concern about the increasing price being paid for building land and what we are trying to do about it. Pending any recommendations the committee might make, we are continuing to encourage local authorities to acquire as much land as possible and build up a land bank. This land could either be let out to builders or let out in private developed sites by the local authority. Acquiring land for the community in this way ensures that the increasing value will be passed on to the community instead of into the hands of speculators.
I have listed the various activities of the Department in the private housing field because this is what we are confined to discussing. We are continuing to implement that policy until some other avenue is opened up to us which will give us greater control over the prices of building land. Where local authorities acquire land and sell it off as private sites a special subsidy is paid by the Department. This State subsidy is equivalent to £150 for every developed site sold by a local authority for private housing to accommodate either local authority tenants or persons of limited resources. This has a double advantage for the purchaser as he has the benefit of low cost acquisition as well as the benefit of a site developed by the local authority plus the subsidy.
During the past few months we have increased the income limits for supplementary grants and this has extended the scope of persons who would qualify for supplementary grants from local authorities. The increase was from £1,050 to £1,250. This is a substantial increase and it has made this additional grant available to more persons. The local loans income limits were recently increased from £1,200 to £1,500. The limits of the loans themselves have also been increased: where £3,000 applied the figure has been increased to £3,300 and where £2,700 applied the figure has been increased to £3,000.
For some months we have been working on the low cost housing programme. Some Deputies have referred to this and I was surprised to hear Deputy Tully's remarks because I began to wonder whether he was aware of the work the Department are doing. I thought it had received a good deal of publicity. I have referred to it in the House and it has been adverted to in newspaper articles and trade magazines. I do not think any Deputy should, at this stage, be unaware of the vast amount of work which is being done in the Department in relation to low cost housing. I hope to be able to make an announcement on the outcome of our investigations in this field in a short time. We have made some progress on it and the community in general will welcome the results of the many hours of labour that have gone into this task. Benefits will accrue to the community in the provision of a good standard of house at much lower cost than they would otherwise have had to pay.
Deputy Clinton raised the question of how firms, which he had some indication were going to be successful in this project, would obtain the contracts. We placed an advertisement in the Press last August inviting builders, architects and any interested company or group of persons to submit proposals to the Department which would enable houses to be erected at a lower cost, but which would comply with certain specifications, which are made available to those interested. It was on a competitive basis, price being the main factor, that decisions were made and these will be announced in detail shortly, although some local authorities are already aware of some of the results.
The Housing Bill, which was passed last year, increased housing grants. From some of the comments made by Deputies one would think housing grants had not been increased for many years. The 1970 Act, which came into force in August, increased the standard grant from £275 to £325 and this was retrospective to houses which were commenced on or after 1st October, 1969. Apart from that increase one of the principal effects of the Bill is that the level of grants now relates to the total floor area of a house rather than the number of rooms in a house. There are different categories of floor areas and the maximum grant of £325 is payable for a house in the category of 800 to 1,050 square feet. The average local authority house is between 800 and 850 square feet, if any Deputy is trying to picture in his own mind what size of house that is.
