Joint Committee on Housing, Planning and Local Government díospóireacht -
Wednesday, 26 Sep 2018

Rebuilding Ireland - Action Plan for Housing and Homelessness: Discussion

Chairman

No. 6 on the agenda is funding and delivery of public housing under the Rebuilding Ireland action plan. In our second session, we will meet representatives of the local authorities. I welcome Ms Margaret Geraghty and Ms Mary Egan from Fingal County Council; Ms Breege Kilkenny and Mr. Joe Lane from Wicklow County Council; Mr. Joe MacGrath and Ms Sinéad Carr from Tipperary County Council; and Mr. Brendan Kenny of Dublin City Council.

I draw the attention of witnesses to the fact that by virtue of section 17(2)(l) of the Defamation Act 2009, they are protected by absolute privilege in respect of their evidence to the committee. However, if they are directed by the committee to cease giving evidence on a particular matter and they continue to so do, they are entitled thereafter only to a qualified privilege in respect of their evidence. They are directed that only evidence connected with the subject matter of these proceedings is to be given and they are asked to respect the parliamentary practice to the effect that, where possible, they should not criticise or make charges against any person, persons or entity by name or in such a way as to make him, her or it identifiable.

Members are reminded of the long-standing parliamentary practice to the effect that they should not comment on, criticise or make charges against a person outside the House or an official either by name or in such a way as to make him or her identifiable.

I thank the local authority officials for their patience and forbearance as we are an hour late getting to them. I apologise for keeping them delayed. There may be votes called during this session but we will deal with that should it happen. We have a plan B in place. There is a bit of difficulty with PowerPoint so we will go straight to questions.

Deputy Ruth Coppinger

I wanted to address some questions to the team from Fingal County Council. I thank them for the detailed presentation they supplied to the committee. The initial part of their statement outlines the scale of housing need in Fingal. Fingal has more than 250,000 people and is the second biggest of the local authorities. It is a diverse borough but with a significant housing crisis, which may be concentrated in particular parts of the council area but it affects everywhere. Let us take that as read.

It is mentioned in the statement that the council is surpassing its housing targets. Any uninitiated person reading that would choke on her corn flakes. The homelessness crisis is getting worse. The statement later refers to 600 families with whom the council is in contact who are either in emergency accommodation or have received notices to quit. That is a huge chunk of the homeless families in the country and it is an increase on the figure from the previous council meeting, which was reported to me by our councillors. Why did the Department of Housing, Planning and Local Government and the council set the target so low? It would seem to me to be a conspiracy on the part of the Department to set low targets that are going to be achieved. It is not doing anything to make inroads into the housing crisis.

My other question concerns the Land Development Agency, LDA. The presentation states that the LDA has identified two sites in the Fingal area on which the agency intends to focus immediately to open up and unlock the potential to yield more than 1,000 units between both sites. The presentation names the two sites. I suppose the council is a passive recipient of Government policy in that sense but is there a point a which council management can say it does not agree, for example, with an action that is effectively privatising 60% of the housing that would go onto one of its own sites? Have the council officials had that conversation with the Minister at all? One of the sites mentioned is Churchfields in Mulhuddart but that is not in the plan. It is in Damastown in Mulhuddart. The proposal is to put 1,000 to 1,200 dwellings there, which I support and called for before the council officially came up with its plan, and did a lot of work to suggest what the mix of that would be. This would be one of the most significant developments that Fingal could undertake.

Blanchardstown is a centre of homelessness. This site, the last significant piece of council land in the area, is crucial. There is some land in Dunsink but that area is not considered part of Blanchardstown as such. I wager that most of the people who are showing up in the Fingal housing figures are from the greater Blanchardstown area. Has Ms Geraghty discussed this site with the Minister? When I raised this issue with the Minister of State, Deputy English, he did not know anything about it, yet he states his Department is in weekly meetings with local councils.

Ms Geraghty states that it is proposed that the lands will support approximately 1,200 units with a tenure mix of social, affordable purchase, cost rental, older persons accommodation, etc. While I agree with having a tenure mix, the devil is in the detail. How much social housing should be on the site? What does Ms Geraghty mean by the term "affordable purchase"? Does she mean an affordable mortgage scheme provided through a local authority or the scheme introduced by the Government, under which people secure a mortgage which can be used to purchase anywhere in the country? What does Ms Geraghty mean by the term "cost rental"? This has not been discussed on the local authority. I certainly have not heard from our councillors that it has been discussed. I note it has been advocated in many quarters. I would like to hear a plan setting out the mix the local authority has proposed to the Minister.

On the Church Fields site, Fingal County Council's submission states: "The site is infrastructure constrained and requires construction of new distributor road, green infrastructure and upgrading" of another road. It continues: "A submission for funding under the Serviced Sites Fund has been made in order to fund this infrastructure." When was that submission made? When will a response issue? The submission states that construction will not commence until the final quarter of 2019. Why must this take so long? The local authority started work on this almost a year ago when meetings were first held with councillors to get feedback. To hear it will be almost two years before anything will happen in an area that is a homeless black spot is simply not good enough. I know the area extremely well because I live right beside it. While another road is needed, roads can be built quickly in this context. Could a road not be built at the same time as housing construction, rather than waiting for all of that infrastructure to be developed before any work commences? This is an emergency and there is an imperative to move rather than wait for two years.

Is it Ms Geraghty's view that there should not be private housing on this site? The reason I ask is that this is the local authority's last chance to make a significant inroad into the housing problem in Dublin 15.

On the costing on this particular site, my understanding is that Fingal County Council has €160 million in its budget for social housing. How much of that is ring-fenced for this project and the other two major projects? How much will the development overall cost? For how much has the local authority asked the Department? Are there other sources of funding available? The reason I ask is the process seems to move interminably slowly. I understand the council agreed to Clúid Housing developing a much smaller housing project about two years ago and nothing has happened. It must not take a decade to develop this site. There is an imperative to move quickly.

Chairman

I received apologies from Deputy Darragh O'Brien who had to leave to meet an Egyptian delegation with the Ceann Comhairle. It is a reciprocal visit. Deputy O'Brien wanted to convey his apologies, especially to the representatives of Fingal County Council, that he could not stay for the meeting.

Senator Victor Boyhan

I welcome all the representatives of local government in attendance. After two and a half years as a member of this committee, I am conscious that we have a housing crisis. We do not need to keep repeating that. To set the context, we have 10,000 people, including 3,600 children in emergency accommodation, and 100,000 on the social housing lists of the 31 local authorities. Those are the facts and we do not have to keep rehearsing them.

I am not here to explain the position on behalf of the Department but it has tried to convince us that it is trying to streamline the entire process. There is always a conflict regarding how housing will be delivered. Local authorities are different and we should not try to homogenise them. I acknowledge and support this difference. If we are to strengthen local democracy, we must support the executive of our councils and the executive must support the elected members in determining policy. Ultimately, the local authorities must have regard to Government policy and, regardless of whether we like it, Rebuilding Ireland is the name of the game at the moment.

I have read all the submissions from Wicklow County Council, Fingal County Council, Dublin City Council and Tipperary County Council and they are very professional. I am as much a critic of local authorities as anybody else. When one is no longer a member of a local authority one sees it somewhat differently from when one was a member. I acknowledge the calibre and quality of the reports that were submitted to the committee in advance of this meeting. It is important to say that because far too often one hears from the Department or somebody else that the local authorities are too slow. We then have the local authorities telling us it is an issue with the Department. The whole process needs to be streamlined.

I was extremely disappointed with the targets. They are not realistic and not good enough in the context of the numbers I mentioned. The witnesses may think differently. We had great fanfare and publicity about the three wonderful summits that took place in the Custom House. We do not hear much about what comes out of them, however. I do not know how all that is measured. However, I have conversations with officials and the committee meets the Minister regularly. For example, we will meet him at some length on Thursday in this very room when we will question and challenge him and his officials.

There are a few issues I would like to ask about. Are the social housing targets fair and are they being met? I presume I can only ask that of the local authorities represented at this meeting. In some cases, they are not stretched enough but there may be good reasons for that, for example, resource or personnel issues. There may be a range of reasons but I would like to hear them and have them placed on the record. This is where we do our business and this meeting is an opportunity for the local authorities, as much as it is for us.

What are the main challenges facing the housing sections of local authorities? I am aware that officials at the coalface of housing are under immense stress and encounter very difficult cases. That must be acknowledged. However, one can understand why there is a tension among those who have been on a housing list for years.

What shortcomings are there in the relationship between the local authorities and the Department? Do the local authorities need greater supports? We keep hearing that money is not a problem but the local authorities are slowing the process. We all know we have to get more houses built quickly.

I thank the local authorities for their position papers, including the comprehensive data provided. The submissions are different and it is interesting to see the different models that are applied. Are the housing targets realistic or could local authorities do much more with greater resources? What are the shortcomings? Do the local authorities need more assistance from the Department? Is the Department a hindrance? Are there better ways of generating synergies? Should we be talking about regional synergies for the development of housing?

Deputy Eoin Ó Broin

I thank the local authority officials for coming in. I appreciate how busy they all are.

My questions are different. Many of us are trying to tease through with the Department, whose officials will appear tomorrow, how we can fix some of the difficulties in the system to increase or speed up the output or remove logjams that many of us believe are in the way of the delivery of houses.

My questions are related to that rather than the individual programmes, if that is okay. First, the new housing need assessment figures have been released and show a drop of approximately 14,000 households on the list last year. The increase in HAP tenancies during that same period of time was 14,000, unsurprisingly. I know not everyone who has come off the individual housing lists has gone on to HAP. Some have gone into council tenancies, while some have come off the list, but it shows that at the net level of real social housing need we are not reducing that figure in any meaningful way. My concern is with the overall figures. I talk about real social housing need as including families on HAP and RAS, as they are in short-term insecure tenancies, and on the latest figures there are approximately 130,000 households. If one looks at the Rebuilding Ireland targets up to 2021, in terms of the real social housing with everything private sector stripped out, there are only 43,000 additions to the social housing stock owned by approved housing bodies and local authorities. I am trying to understand whether it is the Department not allowing the targets to move beyond what I consider to be the low-levels they are at currently or whether there are other constraints that are preventing local authorities. In my local authority in south Dublin, there is a list of approximately 5,800. When RAS and HAP are added there is a real need of approximately 9,700 but the local authority and approved housing bodies will provide only 2,500 units over the coming years. What are the constraints on local authorities having a target of increasing the real social housing stock to make it more in line with the level of real need out there?

Second, there is the thorny question of the cost of the delivery of real social housing units, and I know every scheme is different with different factors. The problem is that I received answers from the Department to parliamentary questions a month or two ago which stated the average all-in developmental cost for real social housing was approximately €200,000. A couple of weeks later, as part of our budgetary scrutiny, the Department of Public Expenditure and Reform gave us figures of approximately €216,000, even though it is meant to be working off the same developments. I received reconciled figures from last yea on the Part V units, and particularly in Dublin a significant gap is opening up between local authority or approved housing body costs and the cost of the Part Vs, up to €240,000, €260,000 or €280,000.

There is also the media reportage, which I am not sure is accurate or not, about the unit costs for St. Teresa's Gardens. I do not know if that is the unit cost or if there are other costs like site contamination works and so on. Will the witnesses give a sense of where we are on the output cost for what I would call real social housing units, owned by local authorities and approved housing bodies?

My other question ties in with the Professor Norris's and Dr. Hayden's report. The approval process frustrates all of us, and I am sure it frustrates all the folks in the councils. How can we shorten it? The Part 8 units are now down to 14 weeks, or whatever it is in statute. The construction is the construction but the approval, tendering and procurement still take 18 or 24 months, or longer. The Minister for Housing, Planning and Local Government is on record saying yesterday on the radio that it cannot be shortened. Surely it can be shortened at the approval end. Is there not a way to use more local authority or regionally shared service framework agreements for social housing builds, in the same way that is done for maintenance contractors? That would be a way to avoid having to go out to tender for every single job. Is there a way of doing that? Would there be an upper limit to what the framework agreement would allow companies on the shelf and so on?

On multi-annual funding, it would make eminent sense to say to the local authorities that if their target is X over four years, there is the envelope of funding. Would that make a real difference and, if so, how would it work?

I know Mr. Tony Flynn is in the newspaper today talking about the value-for-money analysis of any projects costing more than €20 million. Will Mr. Kenny talk us through the practicalities of that? Is it necessary and how much of it is an impediment to delivery? Should we make a case here that there are better scrutiny mechanisms for the funding, rather than having that?

We are all talking about affordability. We are talking about cost-rental, affordable purchase and various models. I know there have been significant breakthroughs in Dublin city and I commend the work on St. Michael's estate. Notwithstanding the criticism of some politicians, it is an innovative project which this committee should support. Could we get an update on that? I presume the recent political antics will have no impact on Dublin City Council, DCC, ploughing ahead with that, as its elected members want. In the case of the other local authorities, however, am I wrong in thinking there is a frustration that central Government is still not coming up with a clear affordable housing scheme for cost-rental or affordable sale? Is that an impediment to the councils? The €25 million allocated in budget 2018 for Ó Cualann-type developments to offset the costs by approximately 75%, which then became €75 million, is still unavailable to the council, as far as I understand. Is that the case, and is the council part of the discussions about that? What do the witnesses think we, as a committee, should argue with the Department in the run-up to the budget to try to get the affordable bit, or whatever model is considered appropriate, up and running? On the basis of what I see, St. Michael's may be the first one but it will be several years before any of those units is available to rent, which seems a real problem. I do not blame the council - it is a departmental issue - but I would like to hear the witnesses' thoughts on it.

Deputy Richard Boyd Barrett

I will follow on from what Deputy Ó Broin said with a point I made to the Minister for Finance, Deputy Donohoe, today about Rebuilding Ireland. It is borne out in the DCC table, which was helpful with targets and completions under the various headings for social housing both for the past three years and the years projected ahead.

The vast bulk of what we hope to deliver in social housing in Dublin is HAPs. The Government keeps saying we will wean ourselves off HAPs, but the councils' targets would suggest we are not weaning ourselves off but rather ramping up HAPs. That is current expenditure out from the council rather than capital expenditure upfront with rental revenue coming in over time. Does it bother the councils that their current expenditure, according to these targets, on money going out to the private sector in the form of HAPs and RAS, will rise even if the targets are met? It will cost the councils more, and they are vulnerable to whatever the private sector decides to charge them, particularly in terms of HAPs. One can argue that there might be a leasing arrangement over a longer time, but on HAPs and RAS the councils are prey to the markets. What do the witnesses think about that? Should we not move in the opposite direction? While HAPs might be a temporary necessity, over time we should wean ourselves off HAPs and see the direct provision of council housing increase and HAPs reduce. If we do not, apart from anything else it will cost us a lot. I ask that based on the DCC figures but it is a question for anybody.

When I look at the targets for HAPs, I wonder if the councils believe they can materialise. In Dublin city for 2017, the targets are 1,579 for homeless HAPs and 1,000 for general HAPs, while for 2018, the target for general HAPs is to go up to 4,000, with 1,000 for homeless HAPs. It is thereafter to be consistently 3,000 for general, and 1,000 for homeless. They almost seem like notional figures we are pulling out of our head to meet certain targets. Can we deliver on them? I do not want us to deliver because we should wean ourselves off HAPs, while ramping up the council housing construction. Even if we set that debate aside, is it realistic to imagine we will get them when the experience we are all getting is that it is hard for people to find HAPs with the current rent situation? Even the HAPs that are secured are not secure because HAP tenants are being evicted. There are probably more than are being evicted, but the tenancies are not secure. I would like to hear the witnesses' concerns about that.

I note the voids restored by DCC are quite a high figure as well, while a high figure was rejected for voids.

There has been much debate about this so could we clarify that those voids are also turnovers, if the witnesses know what I mean? They are not just houses that have been sitting there forever and there are 800 projected every year. If that is true, it implies there are 5,000 or 6,000 empty council units in Dublin City Council. That is obviously not the case. Is it not misleading to say these are voids restored by Dublin City Council? They are not voids and there is a difference between a real void, which sits there without justification for long periods, and of which there are definitely some, and properties that are turnovers because someone dies or a tenancy ends and the properties must be refurbished and so on? Is it not also fair to say that in those cases, the figures are even more misleading as sometimes voids may result from the fact we de-tenanted certain blocks to knock them down and replace them with fewer units than were in the original development? Is the category not just very misleading? There is a suggestion these are additional units that we can clock up as part of our targets for delivering on social housing.

I am pulling my hair out trying to figure out why certain sites do not move. There is a ping-pong game going on between the Minister and the local authorities about whose fault it is that certain sites do not move. My pet theory is there is a battle ongoing over the economics of the development of these sites. The councils are being told that they if they want to develop a site for public and affordable housing, they must tell the Department how the project will wash its face, economically speaking. That leads to pressure either to sell a bit of the land to finance the public and social bit of the site or to have some involvement from the private sector. That delays things and tied to this is the debate about what is affordability and how that level is set. Is this part of the delay in getting these sites moving? It is very frustrating trying to figure it out. The elected representatives of local authorities are saying they want the site developed and public and affordable housing but nothing happens, with both the Department and the local authority giving different explanations for this.

Deputy Ruth Coppinger

Would the Chairman mind if my questions are answered first as I must go? I got my name in early for that reason.

Chairman

That is okay.

Ms Margaret Geraghty

I will address Deputy Coppinger's concerns and I will ask my colleague, Ms Egan, to discuss some of the specifics relating to the Church Fields development. Fingal has a housing list with many people on it, although it has reduced in recent times. It is a matter of record that we have provided 3,422 units of social housing since 2015 and, from that number, 979 homeless families had their homeless circumstances alleviated. It is important to contextualise that. Some of the key elements of the homelessness issue relate to the fact that people in Fingal are experiencing vulnerability with respect to lettings in the private rental sector. Approximately 70% of the people who come to our housing office find themselves in a homeless situation relating to a notice to quit. It is something we are working to address.

I can give some summary numbers for our plan for the various land banks we have. We have set out in our report the land banks we are bringing forward for development over the next few years. We are looking at delivering a mixture of between 1,700 social and 1,700 affordable units. There is a very real need for us to have an affordable housing scheme and for details to emerge with respect to the cost rental scheme. We look forward to both of those emerging and that will assist us in how Fingal puts together its own affordable scheme.

Currently in Fingal, the Rebuilding Ireland loan is proving very popular because house prices in the area are at a certain point. There is quite a bit of private development going on, with more than 72 private sites under development. There is considerable interest from people who are low to middle-income earners in Fingal who can avail of a Rebuilding Ireland loan and who can purchase a house. As we move towards trying to work to mixed tenure communities, I see the Rebuilding Ireland loan, as well as a forthcoming affordable housing scheme, being of benefit to us.

In terms of overall funding by the council, particularly with housing as a key priority for Fingal County Council, 63% of our overall capital budget is focused on housing, with 27% of the overall revenue budget focused on housing. There is a significant commitment on behalf of the executive and members in Fingal towards funding the housing programme. Professor Norris raised matters in her presentation, and we provide a significant pot of funding from our rents each year for the maintenance and improvement of our housing stock. We have a range of cyclical maintenance programmes that have been ongoing over recent years and they will continue in future. Fingal has increased its overall housing stock by 64% since 2006. With regard to the rent yield and ongoing maintenance and improvement of stock into the future, our continued contribution from our revenue budget into a sinking fund to maintain our stock is a key priority.

With respect to timelines for development, one of the big issues facing Fingal and the land it owns has been infrastructural constraint. This means roads, water, waste and green open space community infrastructure. In short, it is infrastructure in the broadest sense, so I am not just talking about one road. If we are to bring sites to the market that can achieve the density that these kinds of landbanks can provide to the housing system and that will be required of us in terms of meeting overall density requirements for housing, we must look at ways of being able to bring a product to the market that can be built at a sustainable price and sold at an affordable purchase level for people seeking their first homes in many cases. The announcement on the serviced sites fund has been very important in this regard. We were asked if we had specifically made an application in that regard. We put in four applications to the serviced sites fund totalling €18 million. We are very optimistic we will get funding, and Church Fields in Deputy Coppinger's constituency is our primary site with respect to the serviced sites fund.

Deputy Ruth Coppinger

How long will that take? There has been an application but have the witnesses heard back from the Department or anything? It is something we can put to the Minister tomorrow.

Ms Margaret Geraghty

The closing date for the applications was the end of August and we submitted the applications by then. We were advised the first tranche of funding would be announced before the end of the year. We are very optimistic about the Fingal schemes as we have advanced those schemes through many of the preliminary stages. We hope to benefit from that funding.

Equally the local infrastructure housing activation fund, LIHAF, funding for Donabate was instrumental in our being able to start the work on bringing that landbank forward for development. Some of the site constraints can also relate to contamination and other issues. We are optimistic, however, from our conversations with the Department, that we have put in four very strong bids for the serviced sites fund and hope for a positive announcement.

In respect of the timeline for development, to take an example, from the time we start thinking about building an extension to our home, bring an architect in to work on it, figure out what services and planning permission are needed, go to tender and get a builder, it can be quite a while before the new room is built. Scale that up to the big land banks and that is what we are talking about. A range of baseline studies is required for housing developments such as environmental impact assessments, appropriate assessments and directives on habitats and otherwise that must be met. There is green infrastructure that must go in and we must ensure that the schemes we design take account of all those issues. In line with that there is the approvals process that we must go through and our Part 8 planning process. Fingal is very lucky in that respect. We have brought almost 30 Part 8s to the chamber and have had the full support of our members on all of them. To shorten the timelines, we try to do much of the work that needs to be done on a site in parallel with the planning process. There is a risk attached to that in that we might not get planning permission or the councillors might accuse us of prejudging their decision. It is a balance and we try to bring that forward and work with the councillors on that.

The real challenge is having to go through a public procurement process which does take a very long time. That is a frustration that my colleagues here will echo. We are working to see what opportunities there are in the process through other types of licence arrangements or otherwise that we can use to bring sites forward incrementally. There is value in that work and we continue to explore. I will ask Ms Egan to respond to the question on Church Fields.

Ms Mary Egan

Church Fields is a large land bank in Dublin 15 and the only significant land bank that we have left in that area. We had our first briefing with the local area councillors last December. We brought the almost finalised land management plan to them on 5 July. Since then we have been working on moving forward in tandem with the Part 8 road infrastructure and the green infrastructure. The first phase of the housing will be brought to the councillors' area committee next week. It is for 25 units, a small element on which we can start straight away. Our focus all the way through has been how soon can we get the process started.

This is the process in motion. We have had three briefings with our local councillors and we have had a meeting with the community stakeholders for this project to date. It is quite a significant project. There has been some work done on the land management plan. We now have the blueprint on how the site would be developed. We have applied for the serviced sites fund, which will enable us to provide the infrastructure, and we will be considering developing significant numbers of social and affordable housing. Affordable means affordable for purchase or cost rental, whatever model fits best, and the rest of the range in respect of accommodation for older people, people with disabilities and anything else that fits into the profile of the site. We will consider all options. We are not closing it to any particular streams. Our focus is on delivery, and we will bring the first phase through next week. From last September to the October area committee this year is significant progress.

Deputy Ruth Coppinger

Twenty-five units seems very small. I know things have to be done in phases but 1,200 houses will take a decade at that rate. Would the planners not go for a bigger first phase?

Ms Mary Egan

The first phase is the part we can build without the infrastructure. We will be bringing forward further parts of the site as we can build them out and see our way through in terms of infrastructure.

Deputy Ruth Coppinger

Ms Egan said that would be in 2019.

Ms Mary Egan

We hope that next year we will bring through a further Part 8, but that depends on the further studies that must be carried out on site. The first 25 can be brought in straight away. That is why we are bringing that element of the site straight through.

Mr. Joe Lane

When we started originally, we worked off average sizes and many infills. These were brownfield lands. Between 2015 and 2018, the average size was 14. It takes the same length of time to build a small unit as a big one. That is when we increased the unit size. We are in partnership with many more approved housing bodies. Over the next three years our local authority build would be approximately 40% of the total. In the rest there would be turnkeys, 13% approved housing bodies, 9% voids, 3% public private partnerships, PPPs, 11% joint venture projects, 20% Part Vs, and approximately 5% acquisitions. We spent a significant length of time on stage 1 to prevent problems being created during the later four stages.

Ms Breege Kilkenny

In Wicklow we prepared our social housing supply strategy in line with the Rebuilding Ireland programme, and the social housing supply element comes specifically under pillars 2 and 3 to accelerate and build the new homes. The first thing we did in Wicklow was to undertake a local authority landbank assessment. This indicated that, even if we were to develop on every piece of land that the local authority owned and that was zoned for housing, we would have only approximately 800 units. Given the numbers on the social housing needs assessment, it was very clear from the outset that Wicklow could not address the housing needs on its own. We applied a multifaceted approach. We had to build up our in-house team. We developed partnerships with the approved housing bodies, engaged with the private sector under the Part V turnkeys, and have a PPP development in Wicklow town. We also procured some architect-led teams to advance our larger schemes, and we are working with the Department to expedite delivery through that four-stage approval process. We are also engaged in purchasing and leasing of units. We considered every avenue to provide social housing for the people of Wicklow.

We commenced our social housing supply strategy in 2015 and prepared a priority list 1. This was developed under the original national document housing strategy 2020 under the previous Government. This consisted of 12 schemes, four of which will be delivered this year within the next couple of months, providing a total of 45 units for 2018. A further eight schemes on our priority list 1 will be commenced in 2018 with delivery expected in 2019, bringing our overall priority list 1 close to 200 units by the end of 2019 under this phase. In 2016, we revised our social housing supply strategy following publication of the Government's Rebuilding Ireland document.

We developed a priority list 2, which consisted of an additional 22 schemes. Of those, 12 will consist of six rapid builds and six of traditional builds commencing early in 2019, with the other ten schemes commencing before the year end.

As Mr. Lane alluded to, we learned from the first phase and moved away from small infill schemes that yielded only a small number of units towards rapid build on larger sites giving a larger number of units. The smaller infill schemes were consolidated for collaboration with the approved housing bodies, and we directed our efforts and resources towards achieving the Part 8 through the council and contracting the administration to outside architects and consultants.

Wicklow has been given a target of 1,225 social housing units by the Department but, with the work we have put into our social housing strategy, Wicklow will reach beyond this to 1,327 units. We will exceed Government targets by 102 units by 2021.

As well as our own local authority build programme, a multifaceted approach for social housing supply will be provided through other mechanisms. That will include some remediation work, our existing stock voids and, as Deputy Boyd Barrett said, many of these will be re-lettings.

Through direct negotiation with the developers on our own behalf and by the approved housing bodies, AHBs, the number of turnkeys and social housing under Part V is significant in Wicklow through acquisitions and partnerships with the AHBs for schemes under the capital advance leasing facility, CALF, and local authority land. That will yield an additional 250 units.

Under Wicklow's social housing supply strategy from 2015 to 2021, the local authority new build will consist of 677 units and other mechanisms will provide 650 units, giving a total of 1,327 units. Essentially, 50% will be our own construction and 50% will be built through other mechanisms. That does not include HAP or RAS.

Mr. Joe MacGrath

I will refer to some issues that were the subject of questions. The committee has representatives from four different local authorities before it, with four different sets of circumstances. I might present a slightly different picture in Tipperary, a large county with a drive time of about two and a half hours from north to south and with a dispersed population. Clonmel is the largest town in the county but there are seven or eight towns with a population of more than 4,500. That brings its own challenges in meeting housing needs. We must adapt Rebuilding Ireland and its five pillars to address the critical need and build for the future. It probably goes without saying that the local authorities, from chief executives, to directors of services, to engineers and everyone else, are fully committed to the delivery of the targets that are set in Rebuilding Ireland.

The Department had significant dialogue with each individual local authority about the targets set for them. The targets have been made clear and it is important to have targets. It is important to have a set of targets which clearly indicate if we are going some way towards meeting our needs. I would not like anyone to think that the target is treated by the local authority as a ceiling. We plan to go beyond those targets. We have outlined, in our opening statement, the overall target of 625 units in Tipperary for 2021. We now believe that will come in somewhere in the region of 769 units. That is 144 ahead of target. We have added the point in our presentation, albeit at a very early stage, that there are some 300 units in early discussion - some turnkey, some AHBs - with which we are also involved. It is important to say that targets are targets. We are confident that those targets will be achieved and surpassed. We do not treat them as a ceiling. We are ambitious not only to achieve our targets, but go beyond them. It is important to say and that ambition would be shared right across the local authorities. I acknowledge the kind comment that was made acknowledging the submissions.

My colleague, Ms Carr, might want to come in on some of the other details, but if I was to highlight a concern in Tipperary in the context of future housing provision and existing housing provision in a rural town, it would be about the existing and future provision of private housing within the county because there has been little or no activity in terms of private housing development within the county for many years. The CSO figures for 2017 show a figure of somewhere in the region of 187 private housing units, with fewer than 30 of those within scheme development. We see the need to address that issue. We have had discussions with the Construction Industry Federation, CIF, at local level about the reasons for that. One of the reasons is the cost of providing the house versus the sale price. One can buy a three-bedroom house in Clonmel, Nenagh or Thurles for €170,000. That is very good value. Our strategy had been to pursue the purchase of housing to address the immediate need, recognising that new houses have to come in after that, but the actual purchase price is in the region of €170,000 or €175,000. The CIF advises that the price would need to rise to about €220,000 to make it economic compared with the build cost. That is an issue.

It is not all about big developers building developments of 200 or 300 units in Tipperary. The backbone of social housing provision in many counties is small and medium-sized builders who build schemes of ten, 15 and 20 houses. They tell us they are struggling to get access to the funding to start working a site. Those are the main constraints for the private sector.

That said, there have been encouraging preplanning discussions in recent months about future housing provision. There is a higher level of engagement about turnkey developments as well. It is to be hoped that corner can be turned. I assure the committee that Tipperary County Council is focused on its responsibility to deliver and exceed Rebuilding Ireland targets and is ambitious to do that.

My colleague might wish to comment on some of the particular issues.

Ms Sinéad Carr

There are one or two other areas that were not picked up on and suggestions as to what could be improved and what could be made more efficient.

People have asked what our relationship with the Department is like. It is very good. I will give Aidan O'Reilly a plug on this. He has been excellent in helping us with removing blockages in the system. Can that be speeded up further? I think it can, although the Department may have a different view. The four-stage process has speeded things up and assisted in delivery, but it could be pulled back to a two-stage process. I say that because there is a development plan with guidelines for standards and density that must be complied with by local authorities. There are templates from the Department on unit costs and design and densities that can be tied in. That can be done and should be thrashed out at the early stages of designing an estate and an agreement reached. One then goes through Part VIII and knows what one has as a result of that. When the tender comes in, that is the construction price of the development. Local authorities cannot tell the cost until it is tendered out and it is at that stage local authorities could re-engage. That would help speed up the process.

There has been discussion around whether the Part VIII should be reduced, or whether special proposals could be brought in to get rid of Part VIII altogether. I do not agree with that. I think there is a significant role for community members.

Tipperary County Council is putting a lot of Part VIIIs through the system. Many of them are in the very early stages and have been addressed very well by members of the council. There is beginning to be a bit of a pushback from communities. It will take a bit of time to get buy-in from the community on the new schemes, but that needs to go through.

The other issue, from the point of view of a rural authority, relates to the tendering process. There are fewer people tendering for our product, maybe because of where we are.

Sometimes the regional frameworks do not necessarily work out in our favour. One might only have two individuals or contractors tendering for a particular proposal. I ask members to be mindful of that.

In terms of the query raised on voids and turnaround, we would probably treat them differently. If the work involved is under a certain amount we are able to turn around our dwellings pretty quickly and we can get tenants in. Where dwellings require more work, and where there is a significant delay, we consider the dwellings to be voids and there is always going to be a certain number of them every year. The funding from the Department assists us in speeding up the delivery on the output of those, so it is important.

We were asked what are the potential challenges coming down the road. It depends on what part of the county one is from, but one of the things we are coming up against at the moment is that when a contractor is on site there is a struggle with the lack of people with the right skill sets on the ground. The cost of blocklaying is increasing. It now costs between €1.50 and €2.50, depending on what part of the county one is from. Contractors are struggling to get blocklayers. There are probably some pinch points in the system which we must seek to address.

In terms of the HAP and RAS schemes, for my sins, I was in housing perhaps ten years ago and I am back in it again now. Back then we did not have a level of flexibility between the different streams to deliver housing. Having four or five delivery streams has been very useful, in particular in the current crisis, and that is to be welcomed. I am inclined to agree with what was said by Professor Norris and Dr. Hayden. Direct build by local authorities and other housing bodies is probably a more sustainable way to go, but there is a role to some degree for the HAP and RAS schemes as well because they do assist.

In response to Deputy Boyd Barrett's question on whether HAP numbers are increasing, the situation is very different in each county. Our HAP numbers are decreasing, but we still have a target of two per week from the Department but we are coming in at 11. That is an improvement compared to where we were three years ago when we probably had one of the highest rates of sign up to HAP tenancies. The number currently is approximately 460 whereas two years ago we had approximately 900. There has been a rebalancing in that regard

Deputy Eoin Ó Broin

Is Ms Carr saying the council has lost half of the HAP tenancies over that period?

Ms Sinéad Carr

No, it is new HAP sign-ups that I am talking about.

Mr. Brendan Kenny

I will respond to some of the questions that were asked. The target for Dublin City Council is very challenging. It is 9,094. When we saw that it frightened the life out of us. I have heard it said that the target was too low. It will be a major challenge for us to achieve that, but it is our aim to do so and exceed it. If we go back to the Department tomorrow and say we can exceed that we will be very happy. The Department will not prevent us increasing that.

One of the challenges for us is land, which is not mentioned often enough. There is a perception that the local authority has a lot of land. We have 120 ha in the city, 93 ha of it is already in the housing delivery report, and the balance of it is in the Ballymun, Cherry Orchard and Darndale areas where there is a huge concentration of social housing.

Senator Victor Boyhan

How much land is there?

Mr. Brendan Kenny

It is 120 ha, of which 93 ha is in the housing delivery report Senator Boyhan has in front of him. The balance of it is in areas such as Ballymun, Cherry Orchard and Darndale. Despite the crisis, it would not be appropriate or sustainable for us to build high rise or high density social housing in those areas so we have to look at other options. Therefore, we are fairly constrained, but it means in 2021 we will have very little to no land left.

The other challenge is around the process. Our relationship with the Department is very good. We are in contact with officials there on a regular basis, perhaps too often, but we have a very good relationship with them. We do not want to get into any kind of blame game. The Department turns around approvals very quickly. I have seen some in recent times being turned around in as little as 24 hours. There are no logjams there at all.

In some cases the prices are coming in very high. I can talk about that later. Serious questions are being asked about why the price is so high. If we engage or make a phone call the situation can be turned around again with 24 hours or a couple of days. We do not have any difficulty there.

It would be helpful if the four-stage process could be reduced to two or three but there are three or four stages in any process. We have to do capital appraisal anyhow. We have to do a cost estimate in any case so it does not take too much time to get it to the Department and to turn it around. The overall process is horrendous in terms of the time it takes to get a contractor on site. Once we get a contractor on site things move very quickly. For ordinary housing in recent years it takes three years from the time we start doing the feasibility study to the time we get houses built. When we built the rapid-build houses last year we cut it down to 50% of that time, which shows it can be done. It is not just a problem with public procurement.

Deputy Eoin Ó Broin

Is that a reduction in the total development time or just the construction time?

Mr. Brendan Kenny

The total process from start to finish. Once we get a contractor on site the works tends to go very well, even though one gets the odd hiccup. The public procurement process is very difficult and I do not see any way it will be changed. It is national policy and EU policy and it involves a significant amount of administration. The timescale is one thing but the administration involves the assessment of tenders, which come in in big boxes and it takes experts weeks to assess them. The planning process includes surveying the site and Part 8 planning. We are now doing emergency planning for most of our rapid-build schemes. Of course that reduces the democratic deficit but it takes six months off the process. In view of the crisis we think it is well worth doing that.

Deputy Eoin Ó Broin

What is the comparable timeline for Part 8s in Dublin City Council?

Mr. Brendan Kenny

It is six months.

Deputy Eoin Ó Broin

Part 8s take six months from start to finish.

Mr. Brendan Kenny

Yes. When we avoid the Part 8 and use emergency planning powers we take six months off the timescale, so we think it is well worth doing that.

Deputy Eoin Ó Broin

The council takes six months off the timescale when it uses emergency planning.

Mr. Brendan Kenny

Yes, we eliminate the six months that would have been required. My view on HAP is that it is a great scheme. It has been hugely successful in Dublin. There are 40,000 HAP tenancies in the country, 9,000 in Dublin, and DCC has 60% of those. The level of evictions from HAP is very low. There is an element of security of tenure. I know it is not long term but generally people are very happy with the accommodation they get. In some cases, in their view they can get accommodation in better parts of the city or county.

There has been too much reliance on the private sector, but we had no option. There was no alternative in recent years because it takes so long to build. HAP has been very successful in that context. It is our ambition to gradually reduce the number of HAP tenancies. The reason the figures are so high in the delivery report is because we have taken over the rent supplement. They are not new HAP tenancies. That is something we have to do and that has increased the figures. We did 240 homeless HAP tenancies in July and 130 mainstream tenancies. That is a total of 370 for just one month. The properties are still out there and the market is very much alive. It is a powerful option for the city council at the moment. We are probably too much reliant on it but it works very well. Without it, we would be in much bigger trouble than we are in at the moment.

Deputy Richard Boyd Barrett

Does Mr. Kenny think it will be easy for the big tranche of transfers from rent allowance to the HAP to happen? In other words, does he think there will be resistance from landlords to the transfer?

Mr. Brendan Kenny

No, we do not think so. We think they are waiting for it to happen. In recent years our concentration has been on new HAP tenancies to cater for people on the housing list and who are becoming homeless. We do not think there will be an issue in that regard.

Some costs were mentioned in the national media in recent days about high costs in St. Teresa's Gardens working out at €500,000 per unit. I do not know where that came from. It is totally wrong. However, it is very expensive. The overall contract is worth €18.9 million, which works out at €351,000 per unit.

Deputy Eoin Ó Broin

Obviously only a portion of that is the build cost and another element is the rest of the development costs. That is very high. It is even higher than a lot of the Part Vs.

Mr. Brendan Kenny

It is.

Deputy Eoin Ó Broin

What is packaged in that unit cost?

Mr. Brendan Kenny

Our sites in Dublin City Council are difficult. There is a particular problem with contamination on the site that is adding to the cost. Up to that our highest cost related to the regeneration in Dominic Street.

It raises affordability issues if it costs us €351,000 to build a unit without any land costs.

Deputy Eoin Ó Broin

I ask Mr. Kenny to provide a breakdown of that figure of €351,000 because it could not all be build cost.

Mr. Brendan Kenny

The build cost is approximately €300,000.

Deputy Eoin Ó Broin

How much?

Mr. Brendan Kenny

Approximately €300,000.

Deputy Eoin Ó Broin

Why is it so high? That is higher than private sector build costs for comparable units.

Mr. Brendan Kenny

Those are the costs coming from the tender. The average build cost in our construction programme in the city is €297,000 but these are much higher and all the signs are that they could increase further.

Deputy Eoin Ó Broin

Is that because they are multi-unit developments or additional costs due to height or is there some other reason?

Mr. Brendan Kenny

No, most of the units in St. Teresa's Gardens are houses. There is a small number of apartments.

Deputy Eoin Ó Broin

I apologise to the Chair for pressing this issue.

Chairman

There was recent disagreement on this issue on the airwaves. I am happy for it to be clarified.

Deputy Eoin Ó Broin

Although each project is different and none of the data therefor are particularly comparable, the data provided by the Society of Chartered Surveyors Ireland, NAMA and even the Department of Housing, Planning and Local Government indicate that build costs for houses, rather than multi-unit apartments, are in the region of €140,000. Costs such as site servicing, land offsets and so on then push the price up to €180,000 or €200,000. How does Mr. Kenny explain the difference between those figures with a build cost of approximately €140,000 and his estimation of build cost, excluding site servicing and land offsets, as being €300,000? That is a phenomenal gap.

Mr. Brendan Kenny

The Deputy is not comparing like with like. Our projects often involved building in an open area and great difficulty with health and safety, traffic and contractor site access. The builds sometimes take place in difficult areas. That was the cheapest price of tenders from seven contractors, which shows the level of difficulty involved. These projects are quite individual.

Deputy Eoin Ó Broin

The price differential is not due to building materials such as bricks and mortar being different from those used for a house built in the suburbs at half the cost. Rather, Mr. Kenny is stating it is due to the conditions in which the build takes place.

Mr. Brendan Kenny

That is part of it. Another factor is that local authorities build top quality units. They often go above guidelines and standards and provide better quality than does the private sector.

Deputy Eoin Ó Broin

I completely agree with that. I tabled a parliamentary question on the matter some weeks ago. The reply details the average construction and all-in developmental costs over the past 12 months for one, two, three and four bedroom houses and apartments of various sizes and indicates that the average build cost for the houses is €140,000. I do not dispute the figures given by Mr. Kenny but, rather, am trying to understand them.

Mr. Brendan Kenny

The average cost of the rapid-build houses we constructed last year was €200,000, which is a far lower cost. We will shortly commence work on volumetric rapid-build apartments and expect that cost to be considerably lower. The cost of construction varies.

Chairman

The build cost is site specific. The same type of house could be built on two very different sites and the tender for one site would be far higher for obvious reasons. The same builder may not bid for both projects because a build is too complicated or the overheads or risk would be too high, as well as the difficulty of skills shortages. Construction cost varies depending on the area and that all contributes to the cost of a house. There is much confusion on that issue in the public domain and it is great to have it clarified here.

Mr. Brendan Kenny

Build cost is very much site specific. Most of our sites are brownfield rather than greenfield sites in the city centre or urban area. They are difficult and complicated sites. We will have a new framework in November for contractors for rapid build which will be available to every local authority in the country and should speed things up.

Work on St. Michael's Estate is proceeding apace. I hope houses will be built there sooner than the seven years mentioned.

Deputy Eoin Ó Broin

I said seven months, not seven years.

Mr. Brendan Kenny

Sorry, I thought the Deputy referenced seven years. We are motoring ahead on that project. It is 30% social housing and 70% full-cost units.

On sites not moving, every site in the city is moving. The big issue is to get approval at local and council level. I am not aware of the Department of Housing, Planning and Local Government delaying a project. Rather, it tries to progress them as quickly as possible. It is sometimes difficult to get approval at local level.

A point which is sometimes forgotten is that the Department pays for social housing. It does not normally pay for affordable housing, which means the local-----

Deputy Richard Boyd Barrett

I ask Mr. Kenny to, please, say that again.

Mr. Brendan Kenny

The Department does not normally pay for affordable housing. That means that the local authority must borrow to fund the development, which can raise issues for the local authority. Borrowing is necessary for cost rental builds, which means that the money must be recouped. For example, we are borrowing from AIB to fund the cost rental units being constructed on St. Michael's estate.

Deputy Richard Boyd Barrett

The council does not need to borrow to construct public housing.

Mr. Brendan Kenny

Correct.

Deputy Richard Boyd Barrett

However, if a scheme involves affordable housing, the council must borrow to fund that construction.

Mr. Brendan Kenny

Yes.

Deputy Richard Boyd Barrett

That complicates matters, to put it bluntly.

Chairman

It is self financing in the long run.

Deputy Richard Boyd Barrett

With the greatest of respect, I did not ask the Chairman.

Chairman

I am asking for clarification.

Deputy Richard Boyd Barrett

I am aware of the political views on this issue. I want to know if Mr. Kenny is stating that because the council must borrow money for affordable housing it is a more complicated process than building public housing, for which the Department provides the funding.

Mr. Brendan Kenny

It is more complicated but it is doable. Such schemes must be viable. The local authority must recoup the money spent on affordable housing. Some local authorities are not in a strong borrowing position.

Deputy Richard Boyd Barrett

Consequently, it is more straightforward to get work on a site under way and houses completed if the development comprises 100% council housing because the local authority only needs to go to one source for funding.

Mr. Brendan Kenny

Yes, it is. However, it is not sustainable to build large-scale social housing estates-----

Deputy Richard Boyd Barrett

That is an ideological view.

Mr. Brendan Kenny

It is. We are not going to build 1,000 social housing units on a site such as that in O'Devaney Gardens, which formerly had 600 apartments and on which 1,000 are being constructed. That would be a big mistake. We must try to get a mix.

Deputy Richard Boyd Barrett

I understand that. That is an ideological issue. I find it very interesting that if one just builds council estates, one can get it done more quickly because it is a simpler process. To me, that says everything.

May I ask Mr. Kenny or the other witnesses one further question? On Part V developments and the 10% we get from them, the delivery level is incredibly low. In 2017, approximately 388 units were delivered under Part V. I find that somewhat extraordinary. It either indicates that the vast majority of private building is in developments of fewer than ten units or that very little private development is taking place. I would like to hear the witnesses' opinions on that. Mr. Mel Reynolds has strongly argued that very little private development is taking place and that developers are receiving planning permission and doing all sorts but not actually building houses. He stated that local authorities should step in and ask for the 10% in land, rather than wait for the 10% of completed units that might never be delivered or might be delivered very slowly. What are the witnesses' views on that issue?

Chairman

Senator Boyhan has indicated that he has a question.

Senator Victor Boyhan

I am conscious that the session is coming to an end and I wish to take this opportunity to thank the witnesses. More important, it has become obvious that the committee is seeing the issue from a different perspective from theirs. I have no doubt that departmental officials are following these proceedings because they monitor everything that goes on at this committee and they do a good job. There is a disconnect and that is a big problem. Differing views are being put forward by the Minister and his officials in the Custom House, the witnesses this evening and the county managers. I have learned a lot tonight. Mr. Kenny put forward a very strong case. I am now aware of the problems he is facing. Other Dublin City Council officials to whom I have spoken told me a totally different story, which is very interesting. Several county managers, or chief executives as they are now called, have told me that they are frustrated by the process. Some council officials listening to these proceedings will tell me the witnesses are to blame. I do not want there to be a blame game but that is the reality. I will tomorrow make clear to the Minister that the next housing summit should take place in the Oireachtas and be televised in order that the public know what is happening.

It is one of the greatest scandals. I like to be positive about things but 100,000 people are on our social housing lists. There are 10,000 people in emergency accommodation of whom 3,500 are children. We have 31 local authorities and city councils. Sr. Stanislaus Kennedy said at a conference last week that we are worse off under Rebuilding Ireland than we were two and a half years ago. That is the reality of it. The figures speak for themselves.

I do not intend speaking much about Rebuilding Ireland tomorrow. I will be directing all of my comments directly to the Minister on a whole new narrative that I have spent some time preparing. I hope he will engage with us on that tomorrow. I think the next summit should be between us; it should be the politicos, the councillors and our good selves. Too much is going on of blame gaming and too much is going on in other rooms. The public does not see what is going on and does not buy into it. Tonight there are children and families in homeless accommodation. There will be people walking the streets tomorrow trying to fill in a few hours. It is a scandal. I am not blaming the local authority officials; I am terribly impressed with their presentations. Tomorrow afternoon I will be saying to the Minister and his officials that it is about time we all sat in and talked about this in a public forum and let the public see what is going on.

I thank the witnesses for their engagement.

Mr. Brendan Kenny

On the voids, they are not long-term voids but casual vacancies. They are the turnovers, as the Deputy said. The long-term voids are all gone. We have some long-term empty apartments for example in O'Devaney Gardens waiting to be demolished and that is it. These are, for us, anyhow, 800 units that become available each year. In our situation, because our property is very old, if we get a house in Ballyfermot or Cabra there may not have been any kind of cyclical maintenance done on it for 30 or 40 years so it is a case of bringing it up to date. If it becomes vacant, we take the opportunity to refurbish it and then, even though it is not an addition to the stock, it is a new house for a family on a housing list. They are casual vacancies.

Deputy Richard Boyd Barrett

I thank Mr. Kenny. I also had a Part V question about taking the land upfront and the council building on it rather than waiting for completed units from the private sector.

Mr. Brendan Kenny

The private sector is not building fast enough at all; it needs to do more. That is something we would be reluctant to do. We can do it under the legislation but our view would be that we would prefer to see the market doing it and getting on with it and then us delivering the Part V, the 10% that goes to us. That is the easiest way. In fairness, we are getting developments in parts of the city that never got them before, the likes of Ballsbridge, the docklands, Donnybrook and areas like that. They are making a big contribution and it is getting bigger. I am not sure about us going down the line of taking the land. It could be complicated and I do not think we could do it any quicker.

Deputy Richard Boyd Barrett

The councils would do it quicker if the developers were sitting on it.

Deputy Eoin Ó Broin

On the voids, we have had Mary from the Department discussing this and we have been around the houses. My understanding is that the bulk of them are casual vacancies; they are just the ones that cost over €40,000 to refurbish because of the lack of cyclical maintenance. Am I to take it from Mr. Kenny's report that those 800 units are the re-lets that are coming out through that process? Is it not the case that when the Department presents its annual output figures of additions to the stock, it is including some of those properties? We get the new builds, the acquisitions, the regenerations and the voids. We have had this conversation with the Department. Of what it is including as new output on the voids, some are expensive casual re-lets, some are long-term vacant, and some are the two into ones that Dublin City Council has been doing. Some of those are slipping into the departmental figures we get at the start of every year, are they not?

Mr. Brendan Kenny

I am not sure, to be honest. We put the figures out in a very transparent way and bring this report to the councils each month. It is in the public domain. We allow people to interpret it in any way they want.

Deputy Eoin Ó Broin

Let me ask the question in another way. In the 2017 output figures that the Department gave us at the start of this year, telling us about additions to the stock, there were figures for voids including figures for Dublin city. Is Mr. Kenny saying that all the voids Dublin City Council did last year are expensive casual re-lets and that there were no long-term voids among them?

Mr. Brendan Kenny

No, there were no long-term voids.

Chairman

We have run over time. I apologise for delaying the witnesses getting home. I thank them all for attending this evening's meeting. We have all found it really useful and hope to meet like this on an ongoing basis - with different local authorities; we will not be dragging this evening's witnesses in every time. It is very useful to have ongoing communication with the committee so that we hear it first-hand. I look forward to continued engagement with the local authorities.

The joint committee adjourned at 8.15 p.m. until 2 p.m. on Thursday, 27 September 2018.