Eoin Ó Broin (Dublin Mid West, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

I thank Mr. Sibley for his presentation. I have a general comment and a couple of short questions. It is always funny when one repeats to the second set of witnesses the same general context as given to the previous delegation. There is huge frustration for those of us in the Oireachtas who are dealing with the housing policy agenda. This frustration is borne out of a number of considerations that form part of the context even though they do not have a direct bearing on the Central Bank of Ireland's deliberations on the consultation. We have possibly the worst housing crisis experienced in recent times. The ability of the State to invest in the social housing that people need is incredibly limited, even with the capital investment increases over the last two budgets. The capacity of the approved housing bodies sector is greater than what it is currently delivering. By most estimates, the approved housing body sector could be delivering up to 4,000 additional social homes annually. It might take them a year or two to get up to that level but that is their potential. Last year, approved housing bodies got approximately €260 million in loans from the Housing Finance Agency, which allowed them to deliver approximately 1,700 units. In the year before, the number was half that. From the housing policy point of view it makes eminent sense to allow approved housing bodies to do the work they do by increasing the overall lending capacity to the sector and to diversify the sources of lending. The frustration arises because none of us are asking the Central Bank to jeopardise in any way or to put at risk credit union members' savings. We are all members of credit unions and we all have savings there. We want those savings, as well as the institutions, to be protected. Credit unions made detailed proposals to the various bodies, as far back as 2014, and we are only now at a stage where there is a consultation. While I very much welcome the consultation, in the context of the housing crisis, the difficulties of direct State investment in social housing and the potential availability of a valuable source of funding for approved housing bodies, most members of this committee and of last year's Committee on Housing and Homelessness do not understand why it has taken so long from proposals being made to a public consultation. My first question is the same one we asked the Department of Finance; how has it taken so long to get to this point?

I will now turn to the second issue. I made a submission to the Central Bank, from a housing policy perspective, stating clearly our preference is for the investment model for all the reasons I believe are self-evident. The proposals from the Irish League of Credit Unions, ILCU, included three funding options or streams and our preference was for the middle option because we believed it was the most prudent in not putting the risk too high at the start and in seeing how that level of investment could go. It could then be assessed and if it was proving more difficult lending capacity could be reduced. If it was proving more successful then lending capacity could be increased. The Central Bank of Ireland's timeline is to complete consideration of the submissions, publish its response and potentially change the regulations by the end of 2017. Is Mr. Sibley confident the Central Bank will meet those deadlines?

The answer to a lot of these questions depends on the specific funding model and vehicle and the interaction between what the Department of Housing, Planning, Community and Local Government offers in terms of supporting finance and availability agreements and what funding vehicle is in place in respect of the Irish Council for Social Housing and the credit unions. In the Central Bank's consideration of these aspects, is it engaging with these other bodies separate to the submissions? If we get right the model, the fund structure and the supports from the Department, then the level of risk will reduce considerably. I hope those conversations are happening, irrespective of submissions. Even if the Central Bank's recommendation or decision at the end of the process is to change the regulations to allow for this new class of investment funding, there is a lot of work to be done to make sure that the funding vehicle is designed in the best possible way to ensure the funds, if and when they are invested, are invested wisely. This is from the point of view of those of us who are members of credit unions - and it is our money - and from the perspective of the approved housing bodies and the individual credit unions.