Vol. 417 No. 6
5 Mr. J. Mitchell asked the Minister for the Environment if he will give an estimate of the total number of dwellings in the State without, (a) an indoor toilet and (b) a bathroom; and if he will outline the steps he proposes to take to eliminate this unacceptable situation.
13 Mr. T. O'Sullivan asked the Minister for the Environment the number and location of local authority houses which do not have bathrooms, and if he will make a statement on the matter.
117 Mr. Allen asked the Minister for the Environment the number of houses in the country without bathrooms at present.
118 Mr. Allen asked the Minister for the Environment the number of local authority houses in the country without bathrooms, and the plans he has to ensure that all such houses have bathrooms installed in the foreseeable future.
119 Mr. Allen asked the Minister for the Environment the number of houses in Cork city without bathrooms at present.
120 Mr. Allen asked the Minister for the Environment the number of local authority houses in Cork county that do not have bathrooms at the present.
I propose to take Questions Nos. 5, 13, 117, 118, 119 and 120 together.
Up-to-date information on the number of houses without an indoor toilet or bathroom will not be available until the results of the 1991 Census of Population are compiled. The 1980 and 1990 surveys of the housing stock, however, indicate that the proportion of the total stock without a fixed bath or shower has been reduced from 19.5 per cent in 1980 to 8 per cent in 1990 in the case of the country as a whole and from 24.6 per cent to 7 per cent in the case of the south-west region. The proportion of the total housing stock lacking indoor toilet facilities has been reduced from 16.0 per cent to 6.4 per cent over the same period.
On the basis of returns from local authorities, it is estimated that 5,700 rented local authority dwellings lacked bathroom facilities at 31 December 1990. I propose to circulate in the Official Report a tabular statement, based on returns for the year ended 31 December 1990, setting out for each local authority the number of their rented houses which do not have bathrooms. Complete returns of the position at 31 December 1991 have not yet been received in my Department.
Local authorities are responsible for the management, maintenance and improvement of their rented dwellings, including the provision of bathrooms. Following the announcement of a new sub-programme in A Plan for Social Housing, a special allocation of £2 million was made in 1991, and again this year, to supplement the authorities' own expenditure in tackling the backlog of work in the provision of bathrooms in rented local authority housing. In addition, the refurbishment of pre-1940 dwellings under the remedial works scheme normally includes the provision of toilet and bathroom facilities.
Considerable progress in eliminating these deficiencies in the housing stock therefore has been achieved. I expect this progress to continue, particularly having regard to the measures to which I have already referred and others, such as the increase in the local authority house improvement loan and income limits, announced in A Plan for Social Housing.
|
Local Authority |
Dwellings Lacking Bathroom/ Shower At 31/12/90 |
|
County Boroughs |
|
|
Cork |
508 |
|
Dublin |
2,172 |
|
Galway |
0 |
|
Limerick |
293 |
|
Waterford |
324 |
|
County Councils |
|
|
Carlow |
0 |
|
Cavan |
17 |
|
Clare |
0 |
|
Cork (North) |
44 |
|
Cork (South) |
18 |
|
Cork (West) |
10 |
|
Donegal |
12 |
|
Dublin |
5 |
|
Galway |
5 |
|
Kerry |
18 |
|
Kildare |
0 |
|
Kilkenny |
39 |
|
Laois |
12 |
|
Leitrim |
20 |
|
Limerick |
5 |
|
Longford |
0 |
|
Louth |
20 |
|
Mayo |
0 |
|
Meath |
0 |
|
Monaghan |
0 |
|
Offaly |
1 |
|
Roscommon |
1 |
|
Sligo |
0 |
|
Tipperary (N.R.) |
8 |
|
Tipperary (S.R.) |
22 |
|
Waterford |
15 |
|
Westmeath |
6 |
|
Wexford |
10 |
|
Wicklow |
23 |
|
Boroughs |
|
|
Clonmel |
0 |
|
Drogheda |
70 |
|
Dún Laoghaire |
652 |
|
Kilkenny |
110 |
|
Sligo |
151 |
|
Wexford |
141 |
|
Urban Authorities |
|
|
Arklow |
7 |
|
Athlone |
16 |
|
Athy |
1 |
|
Ballina |
32 |
|
Ballinasloe |
5 |
|
Birr |
* |
|
Bray |
65 |
|
Buncrana |
* |
|
Bundoran |
0 |
|
Carlow |
0 |
|
Carrickmacross |
0 |
|
Carrick-on-Suir |
42 |
|
Cashel |
15 |
|
Castlebar |
8 |
|
Castleblayney |
2 |
|
Cavan |
64 |
|
Ceanannus Mór |
0 |
|
Clonakilty |
2 |
|
Clones |
0 |
|
Cobh |
28 |
|
Dundalk |
20 |
|
Dungarvan |
81 |
|
Ennis |
0 |
|
Enniscorthy |
32 |
|
Fermoy |
40 |
|
Killarney |
4 |
|
Kilrush |
12 |
|
Kinsale |
19 |
|
Letterkenny |
0 |
|
Listowel |
20 |
|
Longford |
3 |
|
Macroom |
13 |
|
Mallow |
22 |
|
Midleton |
0 |
|
Monaghan |
4 |
|
NAAS |
0 |
|
Navan |
11 |
|
Nenagh |
40 |
|
New Ross |
16 |
|
Skibbereen |
3 |
|
Templemore |
9 |
|
Urban Districts |
|
|
Thurles |
18 |
|
Tipperary |
39 |
|
Tralee |
118 |
|
Trim |
10 |
|
Tullamore |
39 |
|
Westport |
1 |
|
Wicklow |
0 |
|
Youghal |
12 |
|
Town Commissioners |
|
|
Ardee |
1 |
|
Balbriggan |
0 |
|
Ballybay |
4 |
|
Ballyshannon |
5 |
|
Bandon |
6 |
|
Bantry |
0 |
|
Belturbet |
5 |
|
Boyle |
14 |
|
Callan |
* |
|
Cootehill |
10 |
|
Droichead Nua |
* |
|
Edenderry |
0 |
|
Gorey |
2 |
|
Granard |
* |
|
Kilkee |
6 |
|
Loughrea |
0 |
|
Mountmellick |
1 |
|
Muinebheag |
4 |
|
Mullingar |
* |
|
Passage West |
0 |
|
Portlaoise |
7 |
|
Tuam |
21 |
* Information not submitted by the local authority.
Will the Minister agree that it is unacceptable, as we face into the 21st century, that any household or dwelling should be without a bathroom; that there are far too many, whether local authority or private dwellings, without a bathroom? Will he agree also that, with the present rate of improvement to local authority houses, it will be 16 years before all dwellings have a bathroom? In view of that will he inform the House whether he has any further proposals to ensure that at least the end of this century every house and dwelling will have a bathroom?
Certainly the ambition would be to clear that backlog of problems, to ensure, within the shortest possible time — having regard to available finances — every house or dwelling nationwide has such essential facilities. The Deputy will appreciate that the problem has been specially targeted for the first time here. Last year £2 million was provided in a specially designed scheme for this purpose. We must also bear in mind the increased ceiling of income limits, the house improvement loans, refurbishment schemes and the special voluntary housing programmes. Therefore, it will clearly be seen that the Government have taken a comprehensive, extremely dedicated approach to the resolution of this problem. The Deputy can be assured that we will continue to make further inroads into the problems so that it can be eliminated within the shortest possible time. I accept that it is, and always will be, unacceptable to every Member of this House that there should be any dwellings without the necessary essential sanitary facilities.
The House will be rather taken aback that a newly-appointed Minister should show such complacency about such important, basic facilities as bathrooms and indoor toilets. Does he realise that at the present rate of progress in local authority housing it will take 16 years to have every local authority dwelling provided with a bathroom while little or no progress has been made in relation to private dwellings? May I issue the Minister an invitation, bearing in mind that millions of pounds have been spent on the refurbishment of his office block at the Custom House in the past couple of years? Will he agree that, if the same amount of money was spent on the provision of bathrooms in dwellings in Dublin, there would be no backlog at present? I invite the Minister to come with me within a half mile radius of his office to see dwellings without bathrooms or indoor toilets.
The Deputy has deliberately chosen to ignore the essential facts I have given, that over the past ten years substantial progress was made in the resolution of this problem. I intend to make further inroads into it on the basis of the resources available to me. Indeed I would dearly wish not to have to find resources — as would have been the case with my predecessors in this Department — to meet an over-generous house improvement scheme provided by the Government of which the Deputy opposite was a member. They gave grants to people who could well afford to provide these and other facilities. I should like to have that money now available to me, which, I might add, totalled £200 million.
Will the Minister accept that, were the house improvement scheme introduced by our Government still in place, most dwellings now without bathrooms would have them? Furthermore, will he agree that the house improvement scheme abolished by the Fianna Fáil Government five years ago was the cause of so many people living in dwellings without bathrooms or indoor toilets, essential basic facilities?
It is an awful pity the Deputy would not examine in depth the effect of that scheme in terms of usage of resources. It facilitates people who could well afford to provide those facilities and was at direct and immediate cost to the people the Deputy now pretends to represent.
Would the Minister now agree that the house improvement scheme, which was introduced by the Fine Gael-Labour Government, not alone helped to provide basic facilities such as bathrooms, indoor toilets and essential extentions but also gave extremely valuable employment? It is little wonder that the level of unemployment increased after the abolition of these schemes.
I have to say that progress on questions nominated for priority is exceptionally slow and tedious and that the time for these questions is fast running out.
