Oireachtas Joint and Select Committees

Tuesday, 22 March 2022

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Housing, Planning and Local Government

Social and Affordable Housing: Discussion

Mr. Jim Baneham:

I might make a further point. We have done a little bit of that through the €70 million fund and bought some older town centre properties. It requires considerable resources depending on the property. Many of the town centre properties are not regular. They are not like three-bedroom, semi-detached houses. They have their own characteristics. The amount of time resources that go into doing a proper job is disproportionate when one only considers the numbers. That is probably a little bit of a disincentive to local authorities which might have limited staff resources. The time required for a scheme to get a row of, say, three or four houses in Birr back into use could be similar, timewise, to that needed to deliver a brand new scheme of 50 houses down the road. Such work takes time. In terms of the overall output, it is not only about the number of houses but also the changes made to the town. There is probably a bit of a journey to be taken not only to count the numbers but also to consider the impact of the work that has been done.

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