Brian Stanley (Laois-Offaly, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

There is an issue with a local authority house purchased under the tenant purchase scheme, then sold and bought by a private landlord and rented. I raised this issue when I was a councillor. The house is built by the local authority with taxpayer money. A tenant lives in it for 30 to 40 years and then buys it out under a tenant purchase scheme. The house might subsequently be bought by an individual who turned out to be a small-time - in some cases, big-time - landlord. The tenant renting the house would get rent supplement or HAP. The taxpayer was effectively subsiding the rent for a house which the taxpayer built. There is a 20-year rule which can be applied. The county council of which I was a member did not apply it. It is an issue which needs to be nailed down.

There are several ways the Department does long-term leasing which includes Part V housing. About a third of these are lease-to-buy, meaning the local authority would own the unit after 25 years. Then there is lease-to-lease which is the greater number, two thirds. The local authority leases these units under a long-term lease but never gets to own them. After 25 years, it has to start all over again.

Dún Laoghaire-Rathdown County Council, for example, pays €2,300 a month per apartment under this scheme. The cost of that over 30 years would come to €828,000 for an apartment. A cost-to-build unit on public land would come to one quarter of that. This does not make sense. Where is the logic in that approach? Dublin City Council will enter into a deal on former RTÉ lands in Donnybrook which will come to €521,000 for a two-bed apartment and €472,000 for a one-bed. That lease is astronomical.

Can anything be done by the Department to ensure value for money? I would argue more should be going into social and affordable housing but we are not getting value of out such a scheme.