Mr. Dave Dinnigan:

Dublin City Council's vacant homes officer has been there since 2017. He works with all the different teams within housing and the law department. We rely on the data that comes from the census and the property tax assessment. The Deputy will have heard about vacanthomes.iewhere people can report vacant homes in their area and we can go out and carry out inspections. We carry out 380 inspections a year based on information that comes in to us. We also have the advantage of the local area office in each of the five electoral areas. The managers at the senior level know their areas and work closely with communities and residents' associations and, indeed, elected members. We are not exclusive about where the information comes from in respect of what we go out an inspect. There is also a visual element that our guys on the ground can tackle.We are very happy that we have that person in place. They have gained huge experience in the past three or four years around what is realisable around the two schemes.

We think the building renewal scheme is very successful even if the numbers might look comparatively small. People have spoken about the material effect on the rest of the neighbourhood and the street when a derelict or ruinous house is brought back into commission and a family is living in it again. It is something we would be keen to pursue. Repair and lease has been less successful in the city and there are reasons for that.

Nevertheless, it looks as though there is good practice for us to learn from. If that is shared with the rest of the local authority, we would be very happy to see whether there is anything we can implement in the city to let it grow and expand.