Mick Barry (Cork North Central, Solidarity) | Oireachtas source

I wish to focus on HAP. Before doing so, however, I have two other quick questions to ask. In September, Deputy Coppinger highlighted in the Dáil the issue of landlords demanding sexual favours in place of rent. The Minister indicated that he was in talks with various organisations about a national survey next year, not exclusively about this matter but as part of another survey there would be a question on that. I ask him for an update on that.

A constituent of mine bought a house just before the austerity crisis. Their partner lost their job leading to a crisis with household income. The arrangement they had to come to with the bank was that they were bankrupt and they lost their house through bankruptcy. The woman in question has been told that she cannot apply for a Rebuilding Ireland home loan with the council because of that bankruptcy. She has suggested an exemption for people in her position. Would the Minister consider that?

There was considerable correspondence in advance of today's meeting containing lots of facts, figures, graphs etc. The growth of the HAP sector in the recent years is really striking. Spending on HAP in 2016 was €58 million; in 2017, it was €153 million; in 2018, it was €276 million; and, in 2019, it is €422 million. The projected expenditure in the budget for 2020 is €503 million. It is nearly a ninefold increase in four years. This is the privatisation of social housing provision with enormous sums being given to landlords. Some within the sector are enriching themselves on the basis of these transfers. Some 60,000 HAP arrangements were put in place between 2016 and 2019.

The graphs on pages 2 and 3 of the documents we were given show there were 9,208 new builds during that period, which HAP outstrips by 6:1 or 7:1. In the past year, there has been an increase of almost 13,000 in HAP, although it is only the third quarter of 2019, and just over 2,000 in new builds, which is also a ratio of approximately 6:1. Will the Minister drill down into the statistics for 2021 and outline a breakdown or roadmap as to how the flip will take place? I would also like him to drill down into the figures for new builds. How many of the 2,003 new builds in the first three quarters of this year were local authority council houses?

In summary, I would like a breakdown of the 2,000 new builds under the various headings and a figure for how many of them were new council houses. I expect that, unlike the HAP figure, the ratio will not be 6:1 or 7:1 but much smaller. That is probably an important issue the committee needs to get to grips with. I will leave it at that to give the Minister some time to drill down into those figures because they are important.