Oireachtas Joint and Select Committees

Wednesday, 17 May 2023

Joint Oireachtas Committee on Agriculture, Food and the Marine

Revitalising Derelict and Vacant Homes on Farmland: Discussion

Mr. Patrick Davitt:

We have not carried out much research on the 25,000 target but we conducted a small survey a year and a half ago in one county and two small rural areas in that county. In one case, there were 74 houses in one rural area, yet 40 of them were not being lived in because they were either vacant or derelict. That figure is astonishing. At the moment, if we are to believe the census, there are 166,000 of these properties. The rate of vacancy in the UK is not even 1%, even though there are 28 million homes there. Some people might look at us and say we are in a terrible position but I think it is a great position because the stock is there and we can use it if we get our plans and everything right.

We are saying 25,000 because there is no target at the moment for county councils to get any of these properties back onto the market. I do not know what the relationship is between the county councils, whom they are responsible to and who does what, but when we started preparing this report, there were only four or six vacant homes officers among the 31 county council. I make presentations to the Department of Housing, Local Government and Heritage and these county councils on and off, and the most recent time I did one, I think there might have been 27 such officers. At the point we started preparing the report, however, there were very few of these officers, so we said we needed one in every county council.

The purpose of having one on every council would be to identify vacant homes. If I were to ask any county council, with the possible exception of that in Mayo, what vacant houses were in the area, they would not be able to say. Those vacant homes officers should put together a list of these houses. Such a list could be put together, as we say in our report, by estate agents or postmen who pass these houses every day of the week, so the councils could easily put lists together. They could then take the low-hanging fruit and decide whether to bring 5%, 2% or 1% of the houses back into use as long as certain steps were taken. They could identify the ones that would be easy to bring back and the ones that would be difficult, which might need a compulsory purchase order, CPO, or whatever, but there will be many low-hanging fruit to be taken before we even get to that point.

We are saying a target should be put on it. If it is not 25,000, then have a target of 5,000. At least if the target is there and it is hit then that is fine.

The Deputy was speaking about Croí Cónaithe. There is a target there and it is very low. The problem with Croí Cónaithe is the builder only gets the money when the property is built. That is a big problem for them because they must get the finance and interest rates have gone up 3.5% or 4% since the time the scheme began. Now we are in a situation where it is just not possible. By the time people get the Croí Cónaithe grant they have been paying interest in the meantime. That €125,000 or whatever it is - I think it has gone up a bit - is very little compared with then they started off building the house. The county councils must play a huge role in this, but have to be targets. Somebody has to get into a situation where we are going to move this on and get these houses back into production. If we do not, then we are all losing out.

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