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

I thank the Minister for the answers he gave to the previous questions, some of which were interesting. I have a few follow-up questions. The homelessness figures for this month and last month are now on the web and I have had two quick reads of the reclassification report. My questions are factual and we will come back to the substance of this at a later committee meeting. There has been a decrease in the number of adults in emergency accommodations from July to August of 190 and there has been a decrease of the number of children in emergency accommodation by 80, according to the figures published. If I am reading the reclassification report right, it states that somewhere between the survey and now, an additional 741 adults and children have been recategorised as not being in emergency accommodation. The Minister in his opening remarks said there were 238 new presentations in August and 83 exits. I believe that is in Dublin as opposed to State-wide. Can the Minister confirm that at least some, and possibly all, of that 270 decrease is as a result of the recategorisation of people as not being homeless because of his view of the accommodation there are in? I know he does not have the exact number but some, and possibly all or much, of the 270 decrease in the number of adults and children is as a result of reclassification rather than exits from homelessness in August. Ms Mary Hurley does not have the detailed breakdown of the months that those 741 came out but she has given a commitment to provide us with that information when she has it, which would be useful.

My second question relates to categorisation. I will not get into the politics of that, as we will do so at a later stage. In the Minister's recategorisation report, his argument is that he discovered there were families in accommodation that was owned, rented or leased by the local authority and, therefore, in his view, that is not emergency accommodation, and I understand his argument. How are those units different from hubs or the likes of Tallaght Cross, which are owned or leased by the local authorities? I am not clear on how the Minister is making that distinction.

The RTB made an important determination in respect of student accommodation a few weeks ago. I have just emailed it to the Minister and I do not want him to comment on the determination now but he needs to pay attention to it. It was one of the court cases in Galway regarding the significant rent increases that are occurring now. While the determination found that the individual who took the case did not have standing because they were not in a tenancy at the time and, therefore, not subject to the RPZs, there were two important findings in it. The first is that it states the student licences that exist in that location are regarded as tenancies by the RTB and, second, that if somebody had a tenancy now that was subject to something more than the 4%, they would be covered and protected by the RPZ legislation. I ask the Minister to study that determination with his team in advance of whatever he and the Minister of State, Deputy Mary Mitchell O'Connor, will bring forward at a later stage regarding student accommodation because that determination has a material bearing on the conversations we have been having. It basically states that student licences in purpose-built student accommodation are regarded under the terms of the Residential Tenancies Acts as tenancies and have the RPZ protection.

I also wish to ask about the four-stage process.

Finally I wish to raise the four-stage process. The one thing I do not agree with is the idea that the process cannot be improved. We heard from officials yesterday and many have spoken to officials about this previously. An argument is made by some senior officials in local authorities that we could move towards a two-stage process. We could have less duplication and back-and-forth between local authorities and the Department in regard to design and cost approvals. That could shorten the process, particularly in light of the fact that the market ultimately determines the cost in the tender process, whatever about the cost approvals between the Department and the local authorities.

I talk about procurement rules with professionals and academics in the field. They are far more expert about this than I am. They strongly advise that within the legal framework in which the Government has to operate there must be a way for localised or regionalised framework agreements, like those that currently operate for maintenance contracts, to be applied to small and medium-sized social housing builds. That would mean every single project would not have to go out to a new round of tenders. We could have a group of contractors sitting on the shelf to whom works could be handed out. Whether or not that is possible I do not know, and I would like to hear the Minister's thoughts.

We will have a dedicated session on the Land Development Agency, LDA. The Minister knows my view. I would like to see council-led mixed-income and mixed-tenure estates. We do not disagree on the mixed-tenure element. My one concern is that if, in the round, only 10% of what the LDA delivers is social housing, we will be unable to meet the level of social housing output that is required. I would like to know the rationale for setting the figure at 10%. This is a factual question, not a political argument. I know that some sites might have more or less, but all of the documentation and commentary in the public domain indicates that the target is 10%. Given the level of need and the ambitious targets for social housing delivery that the Government says it has under the national development plan, surely the minimum requirement should be more than 10%. Otherwise, all we are going to have is 10% of the big sites and a small amount of infill on council sites. Therefore we simply will not have the capacity to meet the limited targets that the Government has set for itself.