Mr. Frank Curran:

I am chairman of the CCMA subcommittee on housing, building and land use. I am also chief executive of Dún Laoghaire-Rathdown County Council. I am accompanied by Mr. Taaffe and Ms Geraghty of the LGMA's housing delivery co-ordination office, which co-ordinates the delivery of social and affordable housing by local authorities. On behalf of the CCMA, I thank the committee for its invitation and look forward to assisting it in consideration of social and affordable housing.

As members are aware, all local authorities, along with approved housing bodies, AHBs, perform an extensive range of housing services, including a multibillion euro programme of new social housing construction throughout the country. Under the Housing for All programme, local authorities and their AHB partners have been tasked with delivering 47,600 new-build social dwellings by 2026 and an additional 3,500 dwellings via long-term leasing. In addition, local authorities have been tasked with delivering 6,750 affordable purchase dwellings, 800 cost rental and a further 1,400 affordable dwellings via the recent reintroduction of Part V affordable housing delivery.

At present, the delivery pipeline for new-build social housing stands at approximately 23,000 dwellings, of which 11,000 are under construction, 3,500 are about to commence on-site and a further 8,500 are in the planning and design phase. These dwellings are spread over approximately 1,200 separate projects being delivered by local authorities and AHBs. In addition to these figures, proposals for a further 8,000 dwellings are currently being considered by local authorities and AHBs. Local authorities are currently recruiting more than 200 additional architects, engineers and administrative staff to assist in social housing delivery. Arrangements to recruit these additional staff to deliver affordable housing are also being put in place and this is strongly welcomed by local authorities.

In order to ensure that local authorities can deliver housing in accordance with their delivery targets, each local authority was asked to submit a housing delivery action plan to the Department. These plans contain the how, where and when of social and affordable housing delivery over the next five years and have been developed in conjunction with AHBs. The plans are currently being finalised in partnership with the Department of Housing, Local Government and Heritage and are expected to be published in April.

Local authorities are currently developing a significant pipeline of projects to deliver affordable purchase and cost-rental housing. Various procurement and delivery models are being employed, such as design and build, competitive dialogue, public private partnerships, PPPs, and advance purchase arrangements to activate uncommenced planning permissions for housing developments. In addition, local authorities have undertaken a significant review of their existing housing land banks to assess their ongoing land requirements to deliver on the social and affordable housing targets in Housing for All. The review is being undertaken in close co-ordination with Irish Water to ensure there is close alignment between Irish Water and local authority housing teams with regard to providing the necessary infrastructure to facilitate housing development. Local authorities, in conjunction with the housing delivery co-ordination office, are continuously engaging with the Department regarding delivery of social and affordable housing. In particular, there has been extensive engagement on the terms and criteria of the affordable housing fund and the soon to be published affordable purchase regulations.

The CCMA is confident that while local authorities can deliver on the objectives contained within Housing for All, it must be recognised that the construction sector continues to experience issues in relation to material price increases, supply chain delays and disruption, and an increasing demand for skilled workers. These issues have the potential to impact upon delivery and will require close co-operation by all stakeholders for the foreseeable future.