Ceisteanna — Questions. Oral Answers. - Housing Crisis. – Dáil Éireann (26th Dáil) – Wednesday, 5 Feb 1992

Ceisteanna — Questions. Oral Answers. - Housing Crisis.

Jim Mitchell

Ceist:

1 Mr. J. Mitchell asked the Minister for the Environment his views on whether there now exists a crisis in housing supply.

7 Mrs. Owen asked the Minister for the Environment when he will be notifying county councils of their capital housing grant; and whether he proposes to increase the grants considerably in 1992, particularly in County Dublin where the housing waiting lists are at crisis level.

Emmet Stagg

Ceist:

11 Mr. Stagg asked the Minister for the Environment if he will give details of the number of house completions for the years 1990 and 1991 for Dublin city and county; and if he will make a statement on the matter.

Pat Rabbitte

Ceist:

16 Mr. Rabbitte asked the Minister for the Environment if his attention has been drawn to the recent annual report of the National Campaign for the Homeless which strongly criticises Government housing policy; and the additional measures he proposes to take to remedy the situation.

Joe Sherlock

Ceist:

19 Mr. Sherlock asked the Minister for the Environment the reason the findings of the assessment of housing needs, which was carried out more than six months ago, have not yet been published; when it is intended to publish the findings; if he will list the local authorities which have returned the assessments; if he will outline the main findings; and if he will make a statement on the matter.

Gay Mitchell

Ceist:

21 Mr. G. Mitchell asked the Minister for the Environment if he will outline the number of local authority houses built in Dublin in each of the last five years; and if he will make a statement on the matter.

Brendan McGahon

Ceist:

23 Mr. McGahon asked the Minister for the Environment if his attention has been drawn to the serious need for local authority housing in Dundalk and Drogheda in County Louth; if he will outline the number of people who are to be housed in both these towns; and when a programme of housing will be introduced in these towns.

Mervyn Taylor

Ceist:

32 Mr. Taylor asked the Minister for the Environment when the most up-to-date assessment of housing needs will be published; and if he will make a statement on the matter.

Michael D. Higgins

Ceist:

62 Mr. M. Higgins asked the Minister for the Environment when the assessment of housing needs, carried out by his Department earlier this year, will be published; and if he will make a statement on the matter.

John V. Farrelly

Ceist:

153 Mr. Farrelly asked the Minister for the Environment if he will outline, in respect of each local authority (1) the number of planning permission applications for new individual private houses in each of the past three years, (2) the number of these which were refused, (3) the average waiting time for a decision, (4) the number of new local authority houses built in each of the last three years, (5) the number of new local authority houses under construction at present and (6) the number of applications for local authority houses currently with each local authority.

Theresa Ahearn

Ceist:

154 Mrs. T. Ahearn asked the Minister for the Environment the number of approved applications for housing submitted to his Department by (a) South Tipperary County Council, (b) Tipperary Urban District Council, (c) Carrick-on-Suir Urban District Council, (d) Cashel Urban District Council and (e) Clonmel Corporation; if the applications are for standard or special small houses; and if he will make a statement on the matter.

Ruairí Quinn

Ceist:

157 Mr. Quinn asked the Minister for the Environment if he will outline, for each housing authority area the total number of single persons and families with child dependants assessed by each housing authority as being in need of housing under the following headings (a) homeless, (b) travellers, (c) existing dwellings unfit or materially unsuitable, (d) overcrowded, (e) involuntary sharing, (f) young person leaving institutional care, (g) elderly, disabled or handicapped, (h) for medical/compassionate reasons and (i) for cost/tenure reasons, as at 31 December 1991, or the latest date for which these figures are available; and if he will, in the case of any local authority which has not provided figures under the above headings following the most recent housing needs assessment, further outline (a) the particular local authority and (b) the anticipated date for receipt of the outstanding figures by his Department.

Michael Finucane

Ceist:

160 Mr. Finucane asked the Minister for the Environment whether the assessment of housing needs has been finalised by each county council and corporation; and if he will outline the housing need requirements for each county council and corporation.

Austin Currie

Ceist:

162 Mr. Currie asked the Minister for the Environment if he will outline (a) the number on the housing list for each housing area in Dublin city and county and (b) the number of houses in each area currently under construction.

Brendan McGahon

Ceist:

163 Mr. McGahon asked the Minister for the Environment if his attention has been drawn to the fact that there are 360 applicants on the Dundalk Urban District Council housing list; and if he will indicate when a sizeable housing programme will be started in Dundalk.

Dick Spring

Ceist:

164 Mr. Spring asked the Minister for the Environment if he will outline the number of approved applications for housing provided to his Department by (a) Kerry County Council, (b) Tralee UDC, (c) Listowel UDC and (d) Killarney UDC.

Minister for the Environment (Dr. O'Hanlon)

I propose to take Questions Nos. 1, 7, 11, 16, 19, 21, 23, 32, 62, 153, 154, 157, 160, 162, 163 and 164 together.

Provisional figures indicate that new house completions in 1991 totalled 19,600, slightly up on 1990. There is no reason to believe that the current level of output is, in the aggregate, inadequate. It well exceeds the projected annual housing requirements contained in the NESC report "A Review of Housing Policy".

I am, of course, aware that there are problem areas that will continue to require attention. These include the provision of decent accommodation for households on low incomes, the accommodation of homeless and travelling people and the elimination of substandard accommodation. It is for these reasons that the Government published the policy document "A Plan for Social Housing" last year which enunciated new policies and introduced a range of measures which are now being implemented to tackle these issues.

As regards the specific issue of homelessness and the report referred to, I would draw attention to pages 15 and 16 of "A Plan for Social Housing" which deal with relevant policy measures. Since the plan was published, revised guidelines have issued to housing authorities in regard to the accommodation needs of homeless persons and the authorities have been requested to utilise fully their powers to secure accommodation for any homeless persons in their area and to give effect to the measures identified in the plan.

As regards local authority housing needs generally, the position is that details of the assessment of need carried out by each housing authority under section 9 of the Housing Act, 1988, to reflect the position at 31 March 1991 were published last week in the housing statistics bulletin for the September quarter, 1991, copies of which are available in the Oireachtas Library. The results of the assessments will be taken into account, in conjunction with other relevant factors, in the determination of the allocations to individual local authorities for their housing construction programmes in 1992. These allocations will be notified to the authorities as soon as possible but, until the allocations as a whole have been determined, I cannot anticipate what the allocation to any particular area may be.

I am having three statements circulated in the Official Report. The first shows the numbers of dwellings provided by the housing authorities in 1989 and 1990. The 1991 programme projected completion of 1,300 houses but while full returns have not yet been furnished by all housing authorities, those received to date suggest that the number of completions may be somewhat below this figure.

The second statement details the numbers of local authority houses returned by the authorities to my Department as being in progress at 30 September 1991, the latest date for which complete information is available in my Department.

The third statement sets out the position in regard to houses under construction by the Dublin authorities, as returned by them in the December 1991 quarterly reports and the other information requested on housing in Dublin to the extent that this is not available in the Annual Housing Statistics Bulletin 1990. Information is not available to me in relation to particular housing areas of Dublin city and county.

Information is not available in my Department on the number of applications to individual planning authorities for planning permission for new individual private houses or in relation to the processing and determination of such applications.

Tabular Statement No. 1

	Number of houses provided by housing authorities	Number of houses provided by housing authorities
	1989	1990
County Councils
Carlow	15	18
Cavan	56	12
Clare	5	21
Cork (North)	10	24
Cork (South)	19	9
Cork (West)	28	12
Donegal	62	65
Dublin	31	44
Galway	37	22
Kerry	54	66
Kildare	13	17
Kilkenny	4	26
Laois	20	27
Leitrim	28	8
Limerick	16	52
Longford	9	25
Louth	4	56
Mayo	52	67
Meath	34	41
Monaghan	2	19
Offaly	13	15
Roscommon	7	25
Sligo	8	18
Tipperary NR	21	21
Tipperary SR	21	9
Waterford	7	10
Westmeath	2	28
Wexford	31	17
Wicklow	6	13
County Boroughs
Cork	1	14
Dublin	6	35
Galway	20	—
Limerick	8	29
Waterford	—	16
Urban District Councils
Arklow	—	—
Athlone	—	4
Athy	—	—
Ballina	—	1
Ballinasloe	—	—
Birr	—	—
Bray	20	—
Buncrana	—	—
Bundoran	—	—
Carlow	6	—
Carrickmacross	—	—
Carrick-on-Suir	9	—
Cashel	—	2
Castlebar	—	3
Castleblayney	—	—
Cavan	—	—
Ceanannus Mór	—	1
Clonakilty	—	—
Clones	—	—
Clonmel	—	5
Cobh	30	11
Drogheda	—	8
Dundalk	—	1
Dungarvan	5	2
Dún Laoghaire	2	1
Ennis	—	16
Enniscorthy	—	—
Fermoy	—	—
Kilkenny	6	—
Killarney	—	5
Kilrush	—	—
Kinsale	—	—
Letterkenny	—	15
Listowel	13	2
Longford	—	—
Macroom	—	—
Mallow	—	—
Midleton	—	—
Monaghan	13	—
Naas	—	—
Navan	—	—
Nenagh	—	—
New Ross	—	—
Skibbereen	—	—
Sligo	—	6
Templemore	—	6
Thurles	—	—
Tipperary	6	—
Tralee	8	7
Trim	—	—
Tullamore	—	—
Westport	—	6
Wexford	—	12
Wicklow	—	4
Youghal	—	4

Tabular Statement No. 2

	Local authority houses in progress 30 September 1991
County Councils
Carlow	12
Cavan	13
Clare	10
Cork (North)	45
Cork (South)	10
Cork (West)	6
Donegal	80
Dublin	38
Galway	23
Kerry	75
Kildare	28
Kilkenny	—
Laois	13
Leitrim	21
Limerick	23
Longford	15
Louth	16
Mayo	65
Meath	19
Monaghan	10
Offaly	10
Roscommon	20
Sligo	14
Tipperary NR	1
Tipperary SR	21
Waterford	11
Westmeath	24
Wexford	41
Wicklow	30
County Boroughs
Cork	35
Dublin	57
Galway	23
Limerick	3
Waterford	16
Urban District Council
Arklow	3
Athlone	—
Athy	—
Ballina	—
Ballinasloe	21
Birr	—
Bray	—
Buncrana	10
Bundoran	—
Carlow	7
Carrickmacross	—
Carrick-on-Suir	9
Cashel	—
Castlebar	19
Castleblayney	—
Cavan	20
Ceanannus Mór	—
Clonakilty	—
Clones	—
Clonmel	—
Cobh	—
Drogheda	20
Dundalk	21
Dungarvan	—
Dún Laoghaire	24
Ennis	4
Enniscorthy	—
Fermoy	5
Kilkenny	4
Killarney	5
Kilrush	—
Kinsale	4
Letterkenny	17
Listowel	—
Longford	—
Macroom	—
Mallow	—
Midleton	10
Monaghan	—
Naas	—
Navan	—
Nenagh	13
New Ross	—
Skibbereen	4
Sligo	26
Templemore	—
Thurles	12
Tipperary	4
Tralee	6
Trim	—
Tullamore	4
Westport	12
Wexford	—
Wicklow	4
Youghal	7

Tabular Statement No. 3

Housing Authority	Number of housing “starts” authorised for 1991	Number of houses under construction at 31 December 1991
Dublin Corporation	150	66 (including 20 carried forward from 1990 programme)
Dublin County Council	73	17 (16 from 1990 programme)
Dún Laoghaire Corporation	36	10 (all from 1990 programme)

Number of housing completions —1991

	Private houses	Local authority houses
Dublin City	2,214	95
Dublin County (incl. Dún Laoghaire)	3.067	71

Mr. J. Mitchell

Will the Minister forgive me for saying that he sounds like the Taoiseach in the last general election when he said he did not know about the health problems in the country? Is the Minister seriously telling us that there is no housing crisis? Will the Minister join with me this afternoon and come down to the homeless section of Dublin Corporation or Dublin County Council to see for himself the desperate situation there? Would he not accept that with the changes in emigration, the NESC projections for housing needs are out of date already and that there is truly a desperate housing crisis in this city and county and in every county?

Dr. O'Hanlon

Even allowing that the NESC report is out of date — they suggested in 1986 that the need was for between 11,000 and 15,000 houses per annum for the period 1986-96 — as I pointed out to the Deputy, there were over 19,000 houses completed in 1991 which is well above what was recommended.

Mr. J. Mitchell

Will the Minister accept that fewer houses were built in the last five years than in 1986 alone under our Government? Would the Minister not accept that the Government have totally abandoned the homeless, those in need of housing, and those who cannot provide for themselves?

Dr. O'Hanlon

I accept that fewer local authority houses were built in the last five years than in the early eighties. The difference is that we paid for them in the last five years. The Government introduced a new social programme——

(Interruptions.)

An Ceann Comhairle

Deputies, please.

Dr. O'Hanlon

—— whereby there is shared ownership. There are a number of elements in the social programme which will cater for the needs of many of those on the housing lists.

Mr. J. Mitchell

Not one house has been approved under the social programme.

(Interruptions.)

An Ceann Comhairle

Let us try to dispose of the other questions.

Mr. J. Mitchell

Just one more brief question. Where is the Housing Bill which was promised in October, November, December and January?

Dr. O'Hanlon

The Housing Bill will be before the House in the very near future.

Mr. J. Mitchell

We have heard that every week since the Dáil came back.

An Ceann Comhairle

Let us hear the Minister.

Dr. O'Hanlon

With regard to the important parts of the programme for social housing in the Housing Bill, authority has already been given to the local authorities to implement that programme.