Seán Fleming (Laois, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I do not know. Deputy Connolly has pointed out an obvious issue. We will ask for clarification on that point. If it is as it appears, that is great. If there is a subtle distinction in the letter that the Deputy has spotted, we need to know about it. We will ask for confirmation of that particular point.

The next item of correspondence is No. 1754 B from Mr. John McCarthy, Secretary General, Department of Housing, Planning and Local Government, dated 27 November 2018, providing information notes requested by the committee on a variety of points that we raised with him at the previous meeting. We will have a second meeting on the housing issue in the new year. Mr. McCarthy follows up on a number of issues. These are the new regulations for short-term lettings; transfer of funds; the prevention of emergency accommodation being used for families; differential rents which accrued to local authorities; findings of the Dublin Region Homeless Executive; funding of family hub accommodation; breakdown of housing expenditure in 2017 and 2018; regeneration programme details; projected number of homes that could be accommodated on local authority housing lands and the extent of loans attached; children in emergency accommodation; annual assessment of social housing applications received by each local authority and the targets set; different organisations and capital loan schemes in the context of the amounts outstanding, capital advance leasing facilities etc. and where there is an overlap of functions of agencies; credit policy governing loan approval, with reference to separated couples; and lending arrangements in place for approved housing bodies.

That will be useful feeding into our meeting and report on housing in the new year. We will certainly note and publish the correspondence for now. We will hold the matter over for discussion on that day.

There is, however, one issue that is wholly unsatisfactory. I specifically tabled parliamentary questions asking about the credit policy used by local authorities to determine whether a person is eligible for a loan under the Rebuilding Ireland home loan scheme. We all know that approximately 50% of people who apply do not get it. Many Deputies have raised the matter. I raised the matter as a Topical Issue and through parliamentary questions. I was told the matter was confidential and commercially sensitive. I was told the requested information could not be released and so on. When the Secretary General was before the committee we asked him for a copy of the document. If it is the basis on which taxpayers' money is being advanced to people who are purchasing loans, then we are entitled to see the nature of it.

The Secretary General has given us a document. The reference number is 1754 and it is document number 4 in that group. I wish to put on record that this document is totally unsatisfactory and I want the public to know the response we got from the Department. Committee members can bring up the document on their screens. Pages 1 to 3 are fine. Then, we get to page 4. There are already redactions relating to fixed rate loans and variable rate loans. Two paragraphs are fully redacted. That is unacceptable from our point of view. Page 5 seems fine. Page 6 contains serious redaction and we do not know what it is about. Those responsible have blanked out page 7 in its entirety. Page 8 has serious redaction relating to the source of the applicant's equity. Page 9 has another serious redaction relating to the employed applicants. There is another serious redaction on page 9 relating to self-employed applicants. Page 10 seems okay. They have blanked out pages 11, 12 and 13 entirely. Page 14 seems okay. Pages 15, 16 and 17 are fine. Page 18 is blanked out in its entirety. Page 19 is substantially redacted and blanked out. Page 20 is blanked out in the section dealing with exceptions to policy. People would like to know what the exceptions are. There is an evaluation report at the end and explanatory notes as well.

Information was sought by the Committee of Public Accounts in the interests of the public from the Secretary General of the Department of Housing, Planning and Local Government relating to the credit policy for 2018, which is drawn up under SI 25 of 2018. The response is wholly and totally unacceptable. We have been told that traditionally the Department does not give people access to credit policies and banks may not make such policy. However, in this situation what is at issue is public money. We are going back to ask the Department to reconsider the matter and provide more detail. We are going back to ask for the full unredacted copy to be supplied to us.

If the Secretary General has issues in that regard he should, in respect of each redaction, give the specific reason he has chosen to redact each sentence as well as the pages that are blank. Half of the document has been blanked out. It is no way for an Accounting Officer to treat the Committee of Public Accounts. I hope he gets that message. Is that agreed? Agreed.

I am amazed because this is my fourth attempt to see the document. People will know that, especially with 50% refusal, there is much in the blanked out document that is preventing the Rebuilding Ireland home loan scheme from achieving what we and the public believe it was meant to achieve in the first place. Anyway, I have made the point.