I move:
That Seanad Éireann calls on the Minister for the Environment to revise, as a matter of urgency, the house improvements grant scheme.
I am very pleased to have the opportunity of introducing this motion at a time when the building construction industry is in such poor shape. I cannot recall during my lifetime the situation being anything nearly as bad. Those who have been involved in the construction for longer than I have been, tell me that in their lifetime they never saw things as bad either. It is important that anything that can be done to get us out of this situation should be done. This is one area where it is important that a review be undertaken important that a review be undertaken immediately of the house improvement grants and that the amounts, conditions, scope and other details be improved. I notice that in the amendment it is stated:
. . . to keep the terms of this scheme under constant review with a view to its enhancement when circumstances warrant it.
If this had been done, and it should have been done, there would have been no need for this motion.
I should like to refer to the housing cost price index which Members will know relates to a base figure on 1 January 1975. This is concerned with the labour and materials used in buildings only. It does not take into consideration site costs, profits, interest or any other matter — solely labour and material.
That base figure of 100 in October 1981 had risen to 285.4 and at 1 September this year the figure was 431.7. In that intervening period between October 1981 and September of this year the housing cost price index had risen by 146.3 points. This was a very considerable increase. Yet there has been no increase in the grant amounts and these amounts are not over-generous — £200 for the provision of a water supply, £200 for the installation of sewerage facilities, £600 for the building of a chimney and the provision of a fireplace in a house without a chimney, £600 for the provision of a bathroom, £600 for the provision of an extra bedroom to relieve overcrowding and, since 27 April 1982, £600 for major necessary works to the basic fabric of a house.
The grant will not exceed in any case two-thirds of the approved cost, which is worked out by the Department. There is no question whatever but that if these amounts were small when the scheme was introduced in 1981 they are totally out of date now and unrealistic.
I am very indebted to the Department of the Environment, and indeed to the Minister, for details which I received regarding the payment of grants in the past ten years. In 1975 the amount paid under this heading was £2.4 million; in 1976, it was £2.8 million; in 1977, £2.4 million; in 1978, £6.4 million in 1979, £16.0 million; in 1980, £18.5 million; in 1981, £19.4 million; in 1982, £4.4 million; in 1983, £6.4 million; and in 1984, £6.7 million.
Those amounts include grants for reconstruction, water and sewerage for single installations and for disabled persons and essential repairs grants as well as the special grant to reduce dependence on oil. There were three separate house improvement grants and one special scheme in operation at different times during the period concerned but I do not consider it important to go into the details of those.
With regard to the high payments in 1979, 1980 and 1981 there were a number of reasons, apparently, for this. Chief among these was the special scheme to reduce dependence on oil which was introduced as an emergency measure in the wake of the second oil crisis. During the short duration of this scheme, some seven months, the cost to the Exchequer was £14 million or £2 million per month. In addition the decision to abolish all reconstruction grants from 1 February 1980 and the stipulation that the work had to be completed and applications for payment received by 30 June 1981 was responsible for an inordinate number of projects being brought forward than would otherwise have been the case.
To those who would say that before this scheme was introduced the grant payments for improvement were abolished I should like to point out that regarding those very high levels of payments in the years, 1979, 1980 and 1981, in round figures for any one of those years the payments as they were then would have been greater than the payments for 1982, 1983 and 1984 added together. Therefore, there is no question but that the amounts are totally unrealistic and out of date.
With regard to the importance of the improvements grants, as I have said, the building construction industry is in very bad shape and because of that factories engaged in the manufacture of furniture and carpets or in other ancillary business sutter also. It is in our interest to do everything possible to improve this situation. Everyone of us realises the importance of these grants. The Construction Industry Federation had the following to say in a circular which was sent to all Senators and Members of the House regarding house improvement grants. I quote from page 6 of the circular:
This is not a V.A.T. or taxation question but the Minister's comment would be appreciated. We have one million or so dwellings in this country, of which at least 250,000 are 60 years old or more. While all our housein needs continuing maintenance, it is when the age of a house reaches 60 year or so that major refurbishment can become necessary.
Yet we have a very limited scheme of improvement grants which accounted for £6 million in 1984 with a further expenditure of £5 million on local authority loans and other local authority improvement schemes. That is a total of £11 million or about 3 per cent of 1984 Public Capital Programme expenditure or £377 million on housing. Does this represent an adequate investment by the State in maintaining our older housing stock? I would answer unquestionably that it does not.
With regard to the scheme I should like to refer briefly to some aspects of it and in particular to the regulation regarding commencement of work. At paragraph 3 of the document, "House Improvement Grants", it is stated that:
It is an absolute condition of eligibility under the housing improvement grants scheme that work must not commence before the Department's Inspector visits the house. Therefore, you should make your application well in advance of the date on which you intend to start work, and you would be well advised not to start immediately after the inspection but to wait until you get a decision on your eligibility and on the amount of the grant (if any) to which you are entitled. A grant will be refused if you are started before the Inspector arrives.
This is a penal clause. The criterion should be the necessity of work to the House. Grants should be geared to improving the housing stock solely. Very many people have suffered a loss they could not afford because they had done some very small part of the work before an inspector called.
The procedure is completely different with regard to a new house. The condition in that respect, as outlined at paragraph (ii) of condition (c) of the circular is that relating to new house grants:
You have not occupied the house for more than one year prior to the date on which your application for a grant was received in the Department
so one could be up to a year in a new house before applying for the grant. Yet if one does a small part of the works for improvement one is disqualified. The people who suffered were people who tried to affect necessary improvement to their houses, people who needed an extra bedroom, the installation of water and sewerage and so on. I am sure Members on all sides will agree that the procedure up to now regarding the relevant grants is gravely wrong.
I wish to pay tribute to all those in the Department who administer the grants, the officers, engineers and various people involved, but there are long delays in the administration and payment on grants. These could and should be avoided.
I remember some years back the then Minister for Local Government, Mr. Tully introducing a pilot scheme in Country Meath where the grants for new houses and reconstruction grants were administered by Meath County Council. That scheme was a great success. The amount of paper work involved was reduced. Travelling expenses were reduced. People who were involved could call into the central office in Navan rather than have to get in touch with the Department of the Environment. There is everything to be said for decentralisation, including savings in administering the scheme. Again, this is something which would not be controversial and something with which all Members of the House would agree.
Some aspects of the grant could be brought more up-to-date, for example, in the area of solar energy, an area in which it would be worthwhile encouraging people to build conservatories for passive solar energy because it has been proved that a simple conservatory, a glazed extension on the south side of a house, would be a great advantage as regards solar energy. This sould even be encouraged in new houses. In order to encourage this development, a conservatory area should not be included in the area for grant purposes. The qualifying maximum limit for new houses is 125 square metres or 1,346 square feet. The Minister should encourage people to make use of passive solar energy. It is the cheapest form of solar energy in this country. It has been proved worthwhile. If the Minister encouraged it in that way, both in new houses and in old houses as part of the improvement grant scheme, it would be well worthwhile.
Regarding the essential repairs grant, paragraph 17 of the regulations stipulate that:
A grant under this scheme may be paid to a person only where the housing authority (i.e. County Council) is satisfied that a house situtated in a county health district cannot be made fit for human habitation in all respects at a reasonable cost and that the repairs in respect of which a grant is proposed to be paid constitute at least the repairs that are necessary in order to prolong the life of the house. Full details and application forms are available from the County Council in your area.
This is an important grant, although the maximum again is only £600. The regulations vary in the different counties but in County Meath I believe the house has to be in very bad repair and only one elderly person occupying it. In other words, an elderly couple may not qualify. Perhaps the Minister would clarify that.
Why is this grant not paid in the urban areas? In County Meath we have three urban districts — Trim, Navan and Kells. A loaf of bread costs the same in an urban area as it cost in a rural district. If anything, houses in the urban areas may be in far greater need of this grant. I can see no logical reason why people within an urban boundary cannot avail of the grant. I realise it is administered and paid for by the county council but why is somebody entitled to it because he lives outside the boundary while somebody living on the other side is not entitled to it? This does not make sense. It is an aspect I would like the Minister to look at.
With regard to the disabled persons grants, again this is an important scheme but the maximum amount payable is £4,000. That was inaugurated in the late seventies. The amount may be unrealistic. I know from experience it is a very important grant. In the Dublin area those who are qualified to avail of it have the plans prepared for them free of charge by the local authority. This is a facility that should be extended to all areas. It is most important.
We have another important grant which is housing aid for the elderly. In may area it is administered by the North-Eastern Health Board. It is for making the basic fabric of the house habitable and no major works are included. The work is carried out in co-operation with AnCO which, again, results in a further saving. In County Meath the money has been used up for this year. There are 380 people on the waiting list and about the same number has already been attended to. The work mostly consists of the fitting of doors, windows, fireplaces and painting. These small works enable people to live in their homes. It keeps them out of hospitals, county homes and State care: in other words, it is a saving for the State. This is something the Minister might be able to look at to see if it would be possible to increase the amount of money available for these works. We have a short list, a medium list and a long list in the figures that I quoted. Some of the people quoted may be on the long list and they may never qualify for inclusion. It is an important scheme and it would not take a great amount of money to continue it for the full year.
I made a plea before to this House for thatched houses and I would like in these circumstances to do so again. We have a unique heritage of beautiful thatched houses. I have done a study of thatched house in County Meath and found that fewer than 100 of them are inhabited. These will never be replaced. It has been said by concerned people that they should be bulldozed down but I would not agree with that. I attended a meeting of Bord Fáilte officials in Slane in the past year at which Minister Bruton spoke very enthusiastically and rightly of our unique heritage of traditional houses, which included thatched houses.
This State has never erected a thatched house. Local authorities have not erected thatched houses and I would not expect them to do so. They were built in times when money and materials were scarce. It is most important to preserve this tradition of thatched houses. In the North of Ireland thatched houses, especially those considered important, are listed and grants are payable for the preservation of those grant houses. I ask the Minister to introduce such a system here, to list the houses that are worth preserving and to give whatever grants are necessary to preserve them. It would cost roughly £2,000 to have a small thatched house rethatched. On the Bord Fáilte literature the thatched house is included as a symbol of Ireland. I was disappointed that in the recent White Paper on tourism policy this was not covered. On page 26 under the heading "General environment for tourism" it states:
The attractions of Ireland as a tourism destination can be summarised as follows:
(1) Scenery and natural environment . . .
In that area of scenery and natural environment it is most important to preserve all our traditional houses and to give sufficient grants and sufficient financial assistance to the owners to preserve those buildings. I ask the Minister to consider very sympathetically this plea that I make for the preservation of thatched houses.
I would like to conclude with a small extract from the policy submission of the Construction Industry Federation dated September 1985. On page 4 it states under "Housing Repair and Maintenance":
It is estimated that a minimum of 50 per cent of all repair and maintenance expenditure on private houses is done in the black economy. This is the sector which is most open to abuse in the industry. It is not restricted to small works valued at £1,000 to £2,000 but extends right up the scale to include major refurbishment and extensions. In order to promote legitimate employment, it is necessary to introduce a substantial refurbishment grants scheme or reintroduce te residence related tax incentive scheme at a sufficiently high level to fully offset the competitive disadvantage suffered by registered contractors. We estimate that 2,000 to 3,000 legitimate jobs would be created in the industry by such a measure.
In conclusion, I ask the Minister to consider increasing the amount of grants. This is an important scheme and many people would like to avail of it. The amounts are unrealistic having regard to present-day expenses. They should be increased..
Above all, I appeal to the Minister to delete the absolute condition of eligibility. The Department of the Environment make the point that it is not easy to decide when an inspector calls what works are new where an old house is concerned. From personal experience I would say that this is not alway so. Perhaps, a case could be made to fine people in some small way, where they would lose part of the grant if they did not apply in time. I acknowledge the importance of applying in time but the present condition is penal and bureaucratic and I ask the Minister to consider deleting it. I also ask him to consider the other points I have raised in my contribution.