Social Housing Policy: Statements (Resumed).

Mr. Costello

I welcome the opportunity to speak on the issue of social housing. There have been dramatic developments recently in terms of housing policy, housing standards, location of housing and proposals for integration of social housing in the framework of overall housing. For far too long we have been operating almost in a vacuum in terms of social housing. Local authorities built houses as they saw fit, acquiring land for large estates in Tallaght, Clondalkin, Jobstown, Blanchardstown, Ballymun and the inner city. Huge complexes were created in a vacuum without establishing amenities or taking into account employment prospects. While schools were built in these areas they had no shopping centre, hospital or third level institution.

These facilities are being built at present — for example, in Tallaght there is a fantastic shopping centre, a fine new regional college and a hospital is under construction. However, these amenities were not provided soon enough and many difficulties arose which could have been avoided by integrated planning. I hope the practice of building huge housing estates without amenities is a thing of the past. Recent legislation provides that in future local authority housing complexes shall not exceed 75 units, which is very desirable.

The civic charter established in 1991 by the incoming Dublin Corporation specifically stated that for the duration of that council there would be no green field development by the local authority. Instead the local authority would develop the large number of derelict sites that existed, taking into account infill areas that were crying out for housing. The ideas was to rejuvenate the city centre by a combination of private housing and social housing, and by and large that is what has been done in the last five years. There are many cranes throughout Dublin city at present in the construction of apartments and housing developments. That rejuvenation of the city centre is a welcome development and I hope it will continue.

In the past a simplistic approach was taken to social housing, with the local authorities fulfilling their responsibilities by providing housing for those in need. Today there is a much greater mix of housing, which is extremely welcome. We need to fine tune our social housing programme and ascertain which areas can be expanded. Local authorities are operating a substantial house construction programme. It is welcome that the number of local authority houses built has increased from 3,500 last year to 3,900 this year with a 27 per cent increase in the capital funding allocation. During the life of the present Government I estimate that in Dublin alone approximately 2,500 units of accommodation will be built by the local authorities, apart from other areas of housing provision, including those provided by the voluntary housing organisations. Such construction will take place within the boundaries of the corporation area, not on green field sites outside that area. That is a welcome development as social housing must be in conjunction with housing construction undertaken by the corporation.

I welcome the involvement of voluntary agencies in the provision of public housing albeit on a smaller scale than the corporation's involvement. Hundreds of houses are being built in the city and around the country through the operation of voluntary housing organisations. Such voluntary organisations, which operate schemes funded by local authorities, undertake housing construction, draw up letting agreements and set up management structures. The package provided by such voluntary agencies is welcome.

Shared ownership housing schemes are excellent because they make it easier for people to simultaneously rent and purchase accommodation. I hope local authorities will grant mortgages at a cheaper rate under that scheme.

The purchase of private houses is perhaps the most problematic but the main growth area of the social housing programme presently. It is growing proportionately strongest. I estimate that of the 600 units that will be provided by Dublin local authorities, 200 or 250 will be allocated for private housing purchased from the private sector in private residential areas. That represents a substantial increase when compared to previous practice. Infant building sites in local authority areas are decreasing, whether used by the private sector to build apartments or by the public sector. While we maintain a policy of building new housing units within the city boundaries, increasingly we will have to purchase private housing from the private arena. That is desirable, beneficial and key to a good social mix and a proper integrated social housing programme.

As local councillors or politicians, we must give a lead in this area. Too often communities are alarmed that the right type of people may not be housed in their area, that the people housed there may bring drugs into their community and residents will have no control over the matter. Such communities are concerned that if a local authority buys too many houses on the one street or in the one area, it may devalue the property of existing residents' or attract undesirable neighbours. We must reassure people that local authorities operate the scheme in a fair fashion and that there will be proper consultation with local residents, which was not the case in the past. The absence of proper consultation will instil fear among communities. The extent to which such fears may be fuelled was evident in Blanchardstown recently when the Eastern Health Board attempted to establish a satellite clinic. As consultations did not take place the residents were up in arms because they were afraid that the community would be inundated with drugs. That scheme is desirable but must be operated fairly.

The development and operation of a tenant purchase scheme on a permanent basis is desirable. It is welcome that tenants can purchase the homes in which they reside and that they no longer have to purchase another house. That practice will give rise to a more settled community. Tenants will purchase the houses in which they reside, hopefully live there for the rest of their lives and pass it on to their children. Rather than waiting for the development of other schemes, it is welcome that the tenant purchase scheme is now operating on a permanent basis.

The maximum allocation of 30 per cent of the market value of a house in which a tenant has resided for ten or more years under that scheme should be increased. A higher percentage of the market value of a house should be deducted from the selling price of a house in which a tenant has resided for a longer period. In such cases the maximum allocation should be increased from 30 per cent to 50 per cent of the market value of the house over a period of years.

The management of local authority housing is provided under the 1992 housing legislation. Every local authority is obliged to publish a management policy. The purpose of the estate management policy is to focus on tenant participation in the management of flat complexes or housing estates, similar to the work undertaken by management boards of private apartment developments. We have neglected this key area in the past and I am disappointed it is still being neglected. I would like the Minister to take the matter up with my local authority and I am aware she launched an estate management scheme on the south side of the city recently. However, we are dragging our feet in meeting this statutory requirement.

New complexes are being developed as are refurbished complexes and the minimum we should expect is that tenants should be versed on estate management prior to being allocated a premises in such a complex. New local authority housing should not be provided without tenants meeting representatives of the local authority concerned and being informed of the proper operation of an estate management scheme. I do not understand why we house tenants in new schemes, such as that in Sherrif Street, without satisfying that requirement. Hundreds of people have been housed there without an estate management scheme being put in place. We have demolished flat complexes because of mismanagement. Sherrif Street is not an old scheme, it was constructed from 1956 onwards and is not one of the oldest in the city by any means. Part of the problem stemmed from matters getting out of hand there and magnificent new houses have been built there.

We have a system of vetting new tenants, not to keep people out but to ensure nobody involved in drugs is allowed into the flats or houses. We do not have a scheme of estate management and despite pressure, Dublin Corporation is not ready to implement one. I am not satisfied that that should be the case. The new 32 unit housing scheme in Seán McDermott Street is without an estate management scheme and there should be one. One of our priorities must be to get a scheme of estate management in all local authority complexes and I want to see the Minister pressurise the local authorities to a greater degree in that regard because I am firmly convinced they are dragging their feet on it.

We have made some progress on private rented accommodation in recent years. The Minister for Finance introduced tax relief of £500 to tenants in private rented accommodation in the last budget. However, we still have a serious problem in central Dublin from Ranelagh and Rathmines on the south side, to the North Circular Road and I am sure we have the same problem in every town. There is not compulsory registration of landlords and that is the key difficulty. The local authority register is a voluntary one and there is no compulsion on the landlord to be registered or licensed in terms of quality or standards of accommodation provided. A rent book is required but many landlords breach this legal requirement and when it is put to them, they are often in the process of evicting without due legal process.

There are many problems in this area and the only way to deal with them is to devolve the function of registration and licensing of private rented accommodation to the local authority where it would become part of the overall social housing programme. This has not been included in the local authority remit and it should be part of social housing policy. We could then ensure everybody was registered and licensed on a statutory basis just as every publican must apply each year for a new licence to operate. The licensing or registration fee could be used to fund the staff required to maintain the register, licensing, health and fire standards, ensure rent books are being provided and proper legal process is adhered to in dealings with tenants in private rented accommodation. Enormous progress has been made on social housing policy. Attitudes have changed and the Department of the Environment has encouraged this in pressing for change. I congratulate the Minister and the Department on their efforts. I want them to go a step further to ensure the local authorities put statutory estate management schemes in place and ensure private rented accommodation is included in the overall social housing programme.

Mr. Lawlor

Politicians have always seen housing as a primary issue. In the late 1950s housing schemes in Cabra, Crumlin and Ballyfermot — the major large social housing schemes of that era — were constructed in response to an overcrowding crisis in the old city area. Waiting lists were reduced at that time. By the 1960s, the crisis had built up again and Ballymun was the response to the 4,000 or so families who could be housed quickly in a new complex which was ideal in theory. All political parties, other than Democratic Left which was not set up then, can be complimented or criticised for what was or was not achieved with social housing policy in those decades.

I represent two of the new satellite towns created in County Dublin in the 1970s. This was social housing in what are now Fingal County Council and South Dublin County Council. It too was desirable in that it attacked the housing crisis in the corporation area at the time. However, the families being accommodated in new local authority areas were probably inadequately served. It is a matter of regret that a part of my constituency, north Clondalkin, is the only part of the country to be the basis for a task force on urban disturbances and difficulties. The task force highlighted the difficulties in the area and the need for hands on management rather than responding to a crisis by housing thousands of people for instance in north Clondalkin, west Tallaght and west Blanchardstown areas. Deputy Costello mentioned hundreds of people being located in new housing in Sheriff Street, but housing in Clondalkin and Tallaght was in response to an urgent housing need and, in trying to achieve some equity in considering this, one must realise the families were being transferred from overcrowded accommodation to fine, new three-bedroomed homes which were costly from the point of view of the taxpayer. Unfortunately, the back up was inadequate. Locating such large numbers of local authority houses in one region, without giving the authority the ability to provide for community facilities or services, left these communities in difficulties. Dublin Corporation was the housing authority and housing capital was provided. I criticise the Department of the Environment, its Ministers and officials at the time, who had not the vision to broaden the issue beyond capital housing funds and left the rest of the problems to a local authority which was incapable of coping and providing anything like the necessary services and facilities.

I recall local authority meetings vividly at which we discussed the distribution of limited community funds for various projects throughout County Dublin. After a couple of years it struck me that parts of my constituency and that of Deputy Ryan were high on the list for securing funds while other areas did not receive funding. The local community probably had an architect and somebody in the financial arena and a competent development committee who submitted a glossy presentation with which the community affairs people were impressed while north Clondalkin, west Blanchardstown and west Tallaght did not have the same sophistication. The limited funds were going to the projects which least needed them. I criticised this and spoke against parts of my constituency at the time, out of that was born what is now called the CODAN areas which arose out of an argument during a debate on the Estimates when I criticised the fact that funds were going to areas which least needed them while areas which needed them most were not in the queue. Officials took on board the recommendation that limited funds should go to those areas to enable them to catch up.

Under the social housing policy hundreds of millions of pounds of scarce taxpayers' money was used in the construction of those large satellite towns while there was little in the way of investment. This has resulted in a deterioration of those areas and further cost. Not much has changed in the satellite towns and the problems still remain. The benefit of discussing social housing policy here is to try to complete what commenced as a desirable housing programme to accommodate those living in inadequate housing.

In an effort to make local authorites more responsive to the needs of the immediate areas we created a new structure in Dublin. The Minister will recall that she responded to a matter on the Adjournment which I tabled regarding the transfer of local authority and social housing from the ownership of Dublin Corporation to South Dublin and Fingal County Councils. It is deplorable that, as we approach the end of the year, this matter has not been resolved. Dublin Corporation has been sucking the financial lifeblood of rents out of its good quality housing stock in the county and using its resources within the city boundaries. It collects rents, takes them back to City Hall and nothing else is heard of them.

The completion of the taking in charge of housing estates in North Clondalkin was painful. If they had been private developers we would have attempted to have them jailed as we have done regularly. Some of my colleagues from this side of the House who served as Ministers and officials in the Department did not ensure that local authorities took their responsibilities seriously. The excuse is that there is haggling over State resources between local authorities. Why have the Minister and his officials not cut through the bureaucratic red tape between Dublin Corporation and South Dublin and Fingal County Councils, resolved the matter and given responsibility for large housing areas to the democratically elected local authorities who have a responsibility for the greater north Clondalkin, west Blanchardstown and west Tallaght areas. Local authority members representing those constituents have no access to questions, motions or inputs to Dublin Corporation who has responsibility, despite local government reform, for the social housing programme in the greater Dublin area which appears to be logjammed.

Housing maintenance in North Clondalkin is dependent on the efficiency of the housing department of Dublin Corporation in lower Ballyfermot, which is deplorable. South Dublin and Fingal County Councils have submitted their proposals but there has been no definitive conclusion to that fundamental platform of local government reform. The proposal for Dublin arose out of the fact that Dublin Corporation housed thousands of its families in the county area. I urge that something definitive be achieved in this area. I recall that under the legislation the Minister was the final arbitrator. I think a person has been appointed with a view to obtaining a consensus but it is time it was completed.

In regard to social housing, we do not have the same numerical pressures as in the past but we have equally difficult and changing circumstances that need to be addressed. Our social housing policy is trying to respond to changing demographic trends and family sizes and the various aspects of single parenthood and so on. Over the past ten or 15 years one of the social policy housing disasters was under Dr. Garret FitzGerald's Government who introduced a theoretical economic formula of how one could get cheap local authority housing. It arrived at a calculator driven policy whereby if one gave back a local authority house one was given X pounds to buy a private house. What happened in north Clondalkin and west Tallaght? Large local authority housing estates were denuded of their community leaders. Hard-working priests in these communities deplored what was happening saying that the leaders of the parish were suddenly attracted away by a peculiar social housing programme which had a disastrous effect on some of those new areas. I witnessed this and no doubt the Minister and other Deputies all received representation with a view to speeding up the process of the loan applications and the payment of the grants so that those community leaders could move into private housing.

Instead of building housing at £30,000 to £40,000 per unit we were getting houses at £4,000 or £5,000 which saved the Exchequer funding but created a major social disaster. With the wisdom of hindsight we can all be experts in regard to what should have been done.

The joint ownership scheme was slow to take off. For example, there are approximately 200 sites available in a location near me in Lucan where some houses have been constructed but with many gaps in between as clear boundaries were not established. This is related to the points made by Deputy Costello about estate management. The Minister should put in place a master development programme to be overseen by local authorities. This scheme gives young couples an opportunity to enter the home ownership market without a heavy financial burden. I have written to the manager of South Dublin County Council about this matter and the Minister of State should ask her officials to seek a progress report on the overall management of the joint ownership scheme, the numbers who have availed of it and its success rate. I would hate to think that an excellent scheme could be made unattractive due to a lack of proper estate management. Sites can be made very unattractive if the five or six houses already built are unfinished, have no back walls and no boundaries.

The crisis management by the Government has resulted in much private accommodation being rented by the Eastern Health Board. The only return to the State for the expenditure of this huge amount of money is a lack of housing stock and an ongoing drain on resources. An open-ended rent support policy is not logical from an economic or political point of view. The Department of the Environment is not adequately funded while the Department of Health is supporting the Eastern Health Board which pays the rent subsidy. The rent paid to date could have been used to build many local authority houses.

It is easy to understand why single parent families cannot be accommodated in three bedroom local authority houses. Some years ago single parents in my constituency were accommodated in three bedroom local authority houses but this was opposed by young families with two or three children. It is very difficult for public representatives to stand back when they see single parents with young children accommodated in large flat complexes which have very few facilities. Recently at an advice centre a man told me that his wife and two children were living in the family home and he was renting a single room which was in a very bad condition. It is very difficult under the social housing policy to provide accommodation for this man. There is an urgent need for the provision of accommodation for single parents/separated spouses similar to that provided for old people. These people account for an increasing number of applicants on the housing lists, particularly in west Dublin.

I ask the Minister to complete the transfer of corporation housing stock as quickly as possible and to give local authorities the necessary resources to manage large housing estates in County Dublin.

Mr. S. Ryan

I am very pleased to have the opportunity to contribute to this debate. The decision of the Government to initiate a debate on this issue is to be welcomed. Public representatives deal with problems relating to a lack of public housing on a daily basis. In my clinics approximately 50 per cent of cases relate to local authority housing and loans and planning permission for private housing in rural areas of Fingal. Given the collective experience of Deputies on this subject, I hope the Minister of State will give serious consideration to any proposals which would improve the policy in this area. I also ask her to look at any negative aspects of the policy highlighted during the debate. I compliment the Minister of State, Deputy McManus, and the Minister for the Environment, Deputy Howlin, for their enlightened approach to this policy document.

In one of my first contributions as a Deputy I referred to local authority housing or, to be more correct, the lack of it. Prior to my election in 1989 I gave a commitment that the Labour Party would do everything in its power to put local authority housing back on the political agenda. A deliberate decision had been taken by the minority Fianna Fáil Government from 1987-89, and the Fianna Fáil-Progressive Democrats Government from 1989-92, to drastically reduce the level of local authority housing. The statistics bear this out. By the time it left office in 1987 the Fine Gael-Labour Government had reduced the number of families on the housing waiting list from 28,000 to 17,000. However, by 1993 this figure had again increased to 27,500.

People showed their opposition to this disastrous development by taking action. Many housing action groups were formed in my constituency and two of the most successful were in Swords and Balbriggan. These groups led to the formation of two housing coops with the assistance of NABCo. The members of the co-op in Swords now reside in their own houses while the houses in Balbriggan are nearing completion. The co-op option is provided for in the policy document and is to be recommended. I thank the Minister of State, Deputy McManus, for funding the Balbriggan scheme and the Minister of State, Deputy Stagg, for funding the Swords scheme.

During the crisis in 1989 Gerry O'Sullivan and his "Today Tonight" team produced a programme on the extent of the housing problem. I drove around Swords with the camera in the back of my car so that housing applicants could be interviewed in their own environment. The programme which identified the extent of the problem was timely and a huge success. Thankfully, since that date we have been moving in the right direction. The experience of meeting housing applicants in their existing accommodation will always remain with me. Probably long after leaving politics. One family, two adults and two children — representative of thousands throughout the country — lived in a mobile home with no direct water supply or sewerage facilities. The children were aged four and six months respectively. I vividly recall the condensation running down the walls and large droplets falling on the bunk beds. I also saw condensation dripping from the strip of aluminium in the centre of the roof to the floor. The sheets and blankest were wet with condensation in the morning. This is the reality of the housing crisis for thousands of people. When the wind blows in a certain direction, the smoke comes down the chimney into the living area. Was it any wonder that those children had coughs, and were attending the doctor and going to hospital regularly? This is what thousands on the housing waiting list have to bear daily. Should we wonder that marriages are put under severe strain in these circumstances? It is even worse when the adults are unemployed, as many are.

Notwithstanding the need for cutbacks — and we hear right wing economists calling for cuts — I sincerely hope the Minister will build on the progress made since the Labour Party came into office in 1992. I am pleased that the Minister confirmed in her speech that the Government is well on its way to delivering on its commitment of 7,000 new starts this year.

I am very pleased that plans for large council housing estates are no longer under consideration in the Department. We must learn from past mistakes. I believe Dublin Corporation's policy during the 1970s to lift people literally from their inner city environment and drop them in a greenfield development in the middle of County Dublin was disastrous.

Debate adjourned.

Dáil Éireann díospóireacht - Thursday, 7 Dec 1995