Eoin Ó Broin (Dublin Mid West, Sinn Fein)
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I thank Mr. Brennan for his presentation. At the risk of us boring other committee members, some of us will probably repeat some of our comments from the start of the previous session so that the witnesses can know where each of us stands.

Sinn Féin supports the work being done by the witnesses' organisations and their efforts to access credit union and other sources of funding. As they will know, we argued for it at the Committee on Housing and Homelessness last year and have again argued for it in our submission to the Central Bank's consultation. We share the witnesses' frustration over the length of time it has taken this proposal to reach the point of the Central Bank considering it as a possibility. Some of the signals seem to be positive. We are conscious, particularly as constituency representatives who work with families that are homeless or at risk of homelessness, that if the decision by the powers that be had been taken two years ago when the credit unions first made their approach, thousands of families that are not housed currently would have been. That is an important point for everyone to acknowledge.

I will ask a couple of technical questions and I am interested in the witnesses' opinions on them. The payment and availability agreement has always been a complex issue to be negotiated by AHBs and the Department and local authorities. The current system uses a percentage of market rent as opposed to, for example, a calculation based on the cost of paying down the loan plus the AHBs' maintenance of the properties. Would the latter be a preferable model and provide more certainty or would the situation balance out between the swings and roundabouts and peaks and troughs of the rental market over 25 or 30 years?

In the witnesses' experience, do the payment and availability agreements cover their organisations' housing management maintenance and staffing costs?

Going by our discussion with the credit unions, the current arrangement is 30:70 between CALF payments and private financing. Is there an argument at this juncture for us to consider 100% loans so that there is no additional 30% requirement? Would that be advantageous or disadvantageous to AHBs? Does the 30% CALF payment benefit AHBs' overall financing and the structure of that or would 100% loans give them more flexibility? I would be interested in the witnesses' views.

A significant issue for the AHB sector is the capacity to deliver units. In its submission to the Central Bank, the Irish League of Credit Unions, ILCU, set out three funding schedules that in some sense depend on what the witnesses believe is their organisations' ability to deliver. If there was the type of funding that the ILCU and others are proposing, what do the witnesses believe their organisations could deliver above and beyond what is currently in their pipelines?

I am interested in the witnesses' thoughts on affordable housing. Traditionally, AHBs provided differential rent social housing. There is considerable demand for affordable renting and purchasing from middle-income families. Is that an area into which the sector could expand?

What kind of funding could be provided and what are the witnesses's thoughts on that? My final question is for Mr. Coyle. The Irish League of Credit Union's submission to the Central Bank listed the tier 3 approved housing bodies on the basis of their stock in this jurisdiction. Oaklee obviously has a very significant amount of housing stock in the North of Ireland and people may not know that it is a much bigger housing association on this island than suggested by its 400 units here in the South and the information before the committee. The members of this committee might benefit from having a clearer sense of the organisation's profile, North and South.