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

I am going to do that, and I will do it within my time. I have never said that we have a higher rate of homelessness than anywhere else. In fact, I no one in the committee has ever said that. However, we have an unacceptably high level. In fact, there is evidence to suggest that it is higher than our immediate peers, as Eoin O'Sullivan has written about recently. I want to put that on the record.

What is important above all in the mid-term review is the actual target. Are the targets the Minister set out earlier in the year for the delivery of various categories of social housing being delivered? In June this year, the Minister said in answer to a parliamentary question that the targets for this year were as follows: the construction units target was 2,284, the voids target was 766, the regeneration target was 150, the acquisitions target was 1,250, the leasing target was 600, the rental accommodation scheme target 100 and the housing assistance payment was 1,500. We know the HAP targets have been exceeded. They went over that figure in the last HAP report. Where are we now with all of these categories? The social housing construction target was 2,284. How many units have actually been constructed? It would be great to know how many have been tenanted, because that is what really matters. I have no wish to know about what is in the pipeline or in future at the moment.

The point is likewise with the void figures. The Minister has doubled the void targets. The figure has gone from 766 to 1,400. Where did these other void come from? This is one of the things I am trying to get my head around. Does this relate to an extra 700 voids that local authorities have not declared? Are these long-term voids that have not been declared? Are these voids that should have been provided for next year and that have been brought forward to this year?

I am also confused by other figures. Page 34 of the mid-term Estimates book includes housing figures. The figure for the social housing current expenditure programme is 2,250. How does that compare with the figure of 600 for leasing, which is funded through the expenditure programme, in the targets announced earlier by the Minister? Are some approved housing bodies funded through the expenditure programme that are accounted for separately to the leasing figure? What I really want to know related to the new social houses to be delivered this year. How many have actually been delivered to date that have people living in them? That is a useful thing to know.

Reference was made to Traveller accommodation. Page 34 of the book refers to 90 units. Again, we are far behind in terms of the drawdown from local authorities. That is a problem at the local authority rather than at the Department. What is being done to ensure the maximum level of drawdown by local authorities to meet their commitments under the Traveller accommodation programmes for this year? How hopeful is the Minister that we will have a better drawdown at the end of this year than for next year?

My next question relates to next year's expenditure. Can the Minister confirm some details? I presume the €50 million from local infrastructure housing activation fund has been rolled over and added to the €25 million extra funding announced in the budget. That would make the figure for LIHAF €75 million in total for next year. Will the Minister confirm that?

I am also confused because there was no mention in the budget announcement of €25 million for affordable schemes. However, in the Minister's press conference and press release he referenced €25 million, some €15 million of which was for next year for some kind of affordable schemes. Is that new money? Is it re-profiling something within the existing budget? When does the Minister expect to announce all of that?

The next question is on rents and the housing assistance payment. Neither the daft.ienor the Residential Tenancies Board data indexes are thorough. For example, I am on the RTB rental index, but the relevant figures relate to the rent that I signed up to when it entered my tenancy 11 years ago. There is no obligation on my landlord to notify the RTB of the rent increases I have experienced. That means there is an underestimation in the RTB index, just as there is probably an overestimation in the daft.ieindex because it refers to asking rents. I do not believe that means we can dismiss be daft.ierent index, although that is my interpretation of what the Minister has done.

It is important to acknowledge that one of the significant changes in the housing assistance payment policy is that by the end of Rebuilding Ireland we expect approximately 100,000 households to be on a housing assistance payment that is meant to be relatively permanent. Rent supplement was always seen as an emergency payment for a short period. Therefore, there is something significantly different about HAP. We will have the largest ever number of households, according to the Government plan, on a rent subsidy by 2020 or 2021. However, the design of the policy is to be long-term. That raises further questions. Is the Government saying that the policy is now beyond 2020? Is the idea to move people off HAP and into council housing? Is it the case that, as the legislation states, their housing needs will still be deemed to be met and they will remain permanently or indefinitely subsidised in the private rental sector?