Eoin Ó Broin (Dublin Mid West, Sinn Fein)
Link to this: Individually | In context | Oireachtas source

Maybe I have spent too much time at meetings of this committee but I actually think planning is a really exciting profession. If you consider what is being taught in Technological University Dublin, between planning, urban regeneration and transport-oriented development, you will realise the profession is really exciting. Part of the problem is that many go through school not even knowing that planning exists, let alone that it is a career or profession. I completely take the point about entry-level grades of pay, etc., but planning is so fundamental to our society and urban and rural areas that if people had a better sense of what was involved, it could be regarded as much more attractive. It is as attractive as architecture or engineering, but for some reason both planning and building control seem to be the poor cousins by way of reputation. I do not believe that is fair given what the people concerned do.

It is a shame Senator Cummins is not here because this discussion on tenure is very important. There is no empirical evidence from any of the research done on Irish housing to confirm or prove tenure is a determinant of the sustainability and quality of communities. It is one of those things that frustrates me greatly. Probably one of the most important pieces of research on social housing in Ireland, published in 1999 and called the seven estates study, was done by Professors Tony Fahey and Michelle Norris. They studied local authority estates right across the country and confirmed that there are great benefits to mono-tenure. What makes a public housing estate unsustainable is the lack of investment in amenities and infrastructure and the heavy concentration of the tenants' income at the very bottom of the income deciles. Increasingly, what housing policy experts are arguing for is not about tenure – this is not an argument for or against mixed tenure – but about mixed income. Some of our best-quality public housing estates, which are really great places to live, are still predominantly single tenure but have a much broader mix of incomes and professions than some of the newer estates. The solution to Deputy Gould's problem is not private housing but local authorities building affordable purchase homes and letting young working-class people buy their own homes in their communities. This is being done in Moyross and is working very well.

I call the thinking the dogma of mixed tenure because it has become dogma without a proper evidence base. The real problem is that we residualised public housing to be housing for the very poor in the 1990s and noughties. Actually, the problem is the over-concentration of poverty, not the tenure mix. It is important to point that out.

Senator Cummins raised an important point but I would come at it from a different point of view. Mr. Jones's response is useful, so we should clarify this with the Department.

If a private landowner and developer was able to get private planning permission and then evade the tax by way of offering it as a turnkey property to an approved housing body, AHB, for social and-or affordable housing, that would create an interesting conundrum because, arguably, the local authority or AHB acquiring the turnkey property could expect a discount in the purchase price because the developer is not paying the levy. It would be important for us to clarify with the Department whether a developer would no longer have liability for land value sharing tax in the case of a turnkey property. On the basis of Mr. Jones's point about the wording, the developer would not be liable. It would only be where a local authority, AHB or the LDA had got planning permission specifically for the social and affordable development.

Also to remind people, as it gets lost, if a local authority does a mixed-tenure development on its own land of affordable purchase through the affordable housing fund or affordable cost rental housing through the cost rental equity loan, CREL, scheme and social housing, that housing is available to 80% of the working population. Affordable purchase homes can now be bought through the affordable housing fund on an income of up to €100,000, which would put the figure above that. It was €85,000. Private for-profit housing is not actually needed in a public housing estate to have a mixed-income population as households with incomes of up to €85,000 and in some cases €100,000 can access the fund. It is important not to concede to the dogma of mixed tenure. It is mixed income and adequate amenities and infrastructure that create good quality communities. That can be mono-tenure or mixed-tenure. It depends on how it is done.

We should get clarification from the Department on that point because if it is possible to deliver a turnkey property and evade the tax, I want to ensure the local authority or approved housing body is getting the discount. Currently, when an AHB buys a turnkey property, it pays full market value for the land. That is baked into the price. It might get a small discount, but not a Part V discount. It would not be fair if a developer could avoid the land value sharing tax but the AHB or local authority is hit for the full market value of the land. Mr. Jones is correct that it applies where the grant of planning permission is for social and affordable housing. That includes sites on which the LDA is only doing social and affordable rental or purchase, which is currently all of its sites.