Oireachtas Joint and Select Committees
Tuesday, 10 June 2025
Joint Oireachtas Committee on Housing, Local Government and Heritage
Report of Housing Commission: Housing Commission
2:00 am
Micheál Carrigy (Longford-Westmeath, Fine Gael)
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We have no apologies. I wish to advise members of the constitutional requirements that they must be physically present within the confines of the Leinster House complex in order to participate in public meetings. Today's discussion is on the Report of the Housing Commission. The Housing Commission was established in December 2021 by the Minister for Housing, Local Government and Heritage and tasked to examine issues such as tenure standards, sustainability, quality of life issues in the provision of housing, including the efficient functioning of the markets for housing construction and provision. The commission reported in May 2024 with a total of 83 recommendations. The committee welcomes this engagement with the former members of the commission to discuss the report, with a focus on the current status of the recommendations and related matters.
I welcome Mr. John O'Connor, former CEO of the housing and sustainability communities agency, who chaired the Housing Commission; Ms Patricia King, former general secretary of the Irish Congress of Trade Unions; Mr. David O'Connor, architect and former Fingal county manager; Professor Ronan Lyons, associate professor in economics in Trinity College Dublin and director of Trinity research in social sciences; and Professor Michelle Norris, professor of social policy and director of the Geary Institute for Public Policy at University College Dublin, UCD.
We are joined online by Ms Sorcha Edwards, secretary general of Housing Europe, and Mr. Michael O'Flynn, chairman and CEO of the O'Flynn group.
Before we start, I wish to explain some limitations to parliamentary privilege and the practice of the Houses with regard to references witnesses may make to another person in their evidence. The evidence of witnesses physically present or who give evidence from within the parliamentary precincts is protected, pursuant to both the Constitution and statute, by absolute privilege. Witnesses are reminded of the long-standing parliamentary practice that they should not criticise or make charges against any person or entity by name or in such a way as to make him, her or it identifiable or otherwise engage in speech that might be regarded as damaging to the good name of the person or entity. Therefore, if their statements are potentially defamatory in respect of an identifiable person or entity, they will be directed to discontinue their remarks. It is imperative that they comply with any such direction.
The opening statements have been circulated to members in advance and we will take them as read. As agreed at our previous meeting, each member of the commission will have two minutes to make introductory remarks. I invite the former chair, Mr. John O'Connor, to make a statement.
Mr. John O'Connor:
The Housing Commission's report is thorough and cohesive. It outlines a vision and strategic direction for creating a sustainable and affordable housing system for all our people. At its heart is one simple truth, that housing must be a national priority. Our work was guided by a central aim, namely, to ensure that every individual and family has access to a secure, decent home that is affordable and in a good place to live. We examined the changes required in the housing system to improve the lives of people with diverse needs and circumstances at every stage of life. The report reflects the dedication of every commission member and expert contributor. I thank them for their commitment and input. Given the complexity of the issues, achieving consensus on virtually all 83 recommendations and 380 actions was a major achievement.
Let me be clear on one point. We face a serious housing deficit that requires emergency action. We cannot ask a couple in their 30s to wait a decade for a home. That is why the report’s first recommendation is to “Recognise and prioritise dealing with Ireland’s housing deficit and address it through emergency action.”
History offers us valuable lessons. In the aftermath of the Second World War, countries such as the Netherlands and Denmark faced severe housing emergencies. They overcame them through bold strategies and long-term collaboration across political, public and private sectors. Their success was built on consensus and collaboration and has endured for decades. This shows that an emergency is the opportunity to act with courage and commitment for a long-lasting solution. The Housing Commission’s report has the potential to serve as the foundation for a similar collaborative national effort built on consensus, one that can guide us out of this housing emergency and deliver fairer, effective and lasting solutions for the people of Ireland.
Ms Patricia King:
I thank the committee for the invitation to attend today. The work of the Housing Commission was undertaken in a systemic way. The report is a comprehensive study setting out the as-is position relating to each of the subject headings, researched analysis on same and followed by the commission’s recommendations and an action list for each. There were five subcommittees within the commission and I chaired the public consultation and stakeholder engagement subcommittee.
The public consultation involved a number of survey polls carried out by RedC on behalf of the commission, together with a call for submissions. Well over 2,000 submissions were received. Most of these were illustrative of the hardship families and individuals are experiencing during this housing crisis.
While the commission met the Minister for housing on more than one occasion, a meeting also took place with the Taoiseach of the day at his request in 2023. Stakeholder engagement included meetings with several local authority CEOs, Secretaries General of the relevant Departments, specified key officials, CEOs of utility companies and other NGOs of interest. These engagements, together with the terms of reference, informed the commission’s approach. This is well illustrated in the executive summary in section 1, from which I will give some examples. It identified that over several decades a range of interventions to deal with housing have not resolved failures that are fundamentally systemic. A major issue of concern to the commission is Ireland’s housing deficit. It is critical that this deficit is addressed through emergency action. Ineffective decision-making and reactive policymaking where risk aversion dominates impact housing dynamics and undermine affordability in the housing system. These problems have arisen due to the failure to successfully treat housing as a critical social and economic priority. That is evident in a lack of consistency in housing policy which undermines confidence. Finally, we said in the executive summary that only a radical reset of housing policy will work.
Mr. David O'Connor:
I will introduce myself by saying that housing has dominated my career, as an architect in private practice and in the public sector, both as a director of planning and as a chief executive in local government. Housing today is complex and vastly different compared with housing production when I started my career in the mid-1970s. It is intertwined with social, community, health and industrial policies, to name but a few. On the commission, I chaired the work on inquiries into demand, supply and delivery, with a remit to report on medium-term solutions.
Housing demand is primarily driven by the changing population dynamic. Sustained population growth combined with smaller household size is a fatal combination in one way. That combination will drive higher housing need that will grow year on year into the future. Forecasting housing need must now recognise this settled reality. Policy must address this fundamental change. When we add to that the perfect storm referred to by my two colleagues of the overhang of a decade of underprovision it means the continuation of current practice simply cannot cope. Exceptional measures and a system reset are now essential. For housing supply, this means upscaling our output, prioritising outcome over exerting control, a focus on practical priorities, sequencing infrastructure first, viability driven by reducing uncertainties and developing systems that are always measured against outcome. It is critical that outcome is the priority. Housing delivery in the past was primarily by local government. Housing is essentially a technical system. It must be about production, building homes and creating healthy, equitable and sustainable communities.
The increasing complexity of governance of democratic centred systems is an international problem. Complex systems inevitably mean subdivisions of function that develop their respective sectoral focus for themselves. Each becomes orientated on their own function and the governance of that. This kind of complexity is also found in large business entities. Taking hold of all this, and even identifying it, is best achieved by single-focus, outcome-centred, functionally independent, experienced people reporting on practical solutions for a programme of resolution – I stress that point – for those with overall responsibilities to make the decisions.
Dr. Ronan Lyons:
I am grateful for the opportunity to join today’s discussion. I served as chair of the commission’s demand working group.
I was also chair of the minority report subcommittee which we can chat about later on if we wish or indeed, changes to rent pressure zones. As time is limited I will focus my opening remarks on the work of that demand working group. I wish publicly to thank all the members and our research support for their efforts in contributing to a fuller understanding of Ireland's medium- to long-term housing requirement. Despite the use of demand in the name of the group, the working group decided early on that housing requirement more than demand or need was the appropriate word because it avoids connotations of markets alone or indeed just meeting some basic minimum. Over the course of 18 months, the working group met frequently and discussed a variety of drivers of Ireland's housing requirement including factors affecting population size such as fertility, mortality and international migration. The group also considered how the population is organised into households. Through five complementary measures, including a unique survey of Ireland's younger adults, a consensus housing deficit for April 2022, the last census, was estimated at between 212,000 and 256,000 homes. That deficit which shows up principally through elevated household size, is ultimately about the inability of Ireland's younger adults to set up their own households. As it reflects data from over three years ago and does not account for any increased emigration or lower fertility due to a lack of housing, it should be regarded as a lower band.
In addition to a comparative perspective looking at how jurisdictions such as Northern Ireland or Scotland estimate their housing requirements, the demand working group also considered a range of other factors relevant to understanding the requirement including obsolescence, vacancy and dereliction, internal migration and the regional distribution of housing requirements, ageing and the type of housing required. The final report submitted by the working group to the commission ran to 150 pages and more than 53,000 words. It was after careful consideration of this material that the commission included six recommendations relating to Ireland's housing requirement including the one mentioned by Mr. John O'Connor in his opening remarks.
Table 2.2 of the report gives the commission's sense of how many homes are needed per year between 2024 and 2050. Those numbers range from 33,000 up to 81,000. As the commission noted in its report, the uncertainty in that large range is important. I will finish there but I look forward to the discussion. Thanks again for the opportunity to speak today.
Professor Michelle Norris:
I thank the Chair and members of the committee for the invitation. I chaired the Housing Commission's tenure and community subcommittee, which examined the rented housing sector. It contributed about half of the recommendations of the commission's report and these set out a comprehensive plan for improving the availability, affordability and quality of rented housing. Among these recommendations the most important in my view is that 20% of the housing stock should be provided outside the market as social and cost rental. This is necessary because the private rental sector does not have the capacity to provide sufficient affordable housing to meet the needs of large sections of the population. Implementing the recommendation would mean that the current size of the social and cost-rental housing sector in Ireland would need to double. This in turn would require comprehensive reform of arrangements for financing and delivering this type of housing. The commission sets out a detailed plan for this encompassing linking rents for housing to the costs of delivery to provide a stable source of revenue for managing and maintaining the dwellings and servicing debt to provide the dwellings; providing housing allowances like HAP to tenants who cannot pay the cost rents and also allowing groups of local authorities to set up shared organisations called local authority housing organisations to provide and manage their social housing. That would overcome the capacity problems in the sector at the moment and allow local authorities to recruit and retain the expert staff they need to provide housing.
The commission report also sets out a comprehensive plan for reforming regulation of rented housing. We propose amalgamating the patchwork of regulatory organisations, regulating local authority housing for the first time and strengthening regulatory enforcement. We propose comprehensive reform of the system of rent pressure zones, RPZs, which was introduced as an emergency measure in 2016 to regulate private rents and was never intended to be in place over the long term. RPZs only cover part of the country and limit rent increases to 2% per annum. The rationale for the 2% cap is unclear and the commission was concerned it applies irrespective of the quality of the dwelling and how far below market the rent is. We propose replacing RPZs with a reference rent system used to regulate rents in many other European countries. This is a nationwide system that would peg rent increases to dwellings of similar quality and location. The system could be designed strategically to better balance the interests of tenants and landlords and incentivise better outcomes by, for instance, pegging rent increases to building energy ratings. Once in place, the regulator would conduct regular evidence-based reviews of the system and amend the regulations as appropriate in a similar fashion to the way that the Central Bank regulates mortgage markets. This would help to depoliticise the debate about rent regulation, strengthen the evidence base for policy and provide greater certainty for tenants and landlords.
Micheál Carrigy (Longford-Westmeath, Fine Gael)
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I call Ms Sorcha Edwards, who is online.
Ms Sorcha Edwards:
It was an honour for me to take part in the work of the commission with the experts in the room but also the additional multiple experts who took part in the work of the separate working groups. This process could be recommended for other member states because many of them are struggling to bring the different actors involved on the same line in terms of what is needed to address the housing crisis. It is an exercise that is worth talking about throughout the EU.
I have worked for more than 20 years in the field of public social and co-operative housing at a European and international level. Therefore, I would like to reinforce section 8 recommendation No. 45, for a change in the approach to housing in Ireland with a substantial increase in the amount of social and cost-rental housing being delivered. From my perspective that not only increases the amount of housing available for key workers but it also increases the capacity of local authorities and cities to cater for those with special needs such as people with a disability and for elderly people who are rightsizing. It also enables us to be more proactive in terms of catering for the climate challenge by reducing the carbon footprint of existing homes and through more responsible delivery of new homes with consideration given to a lower carbon footprint. Overall, it enables us to have a bigger, more responsible part of the housing sector which is not only driven by profit, but is a viable sector while not extracting profit to the same extent as other parts of the housing market. I would reinforce that.
As part of the section 8 recommendations I would stress again that as we have recommended the diversification of funding, I would link that to another recommendation where we take the example of France where they are recycling finance from private savings into a national bank which is working on a not-for-profit basis delivering funding for the housing sector. Many people are thinking about that diversification of funding in Ireland. That could be one of the excellent ideas that could go in. We should also look at No. 54, the issue around choice based lettings and the very varied rates of rent within the social and cost rental housing sector in Ireland. This needs to be streamlined to allow the increase in capacity and increase of delivery that is not happening at the moment.
I would stress No. 48 as well, regarding the importance of keeping the finance in the sector. That means working on the basis of funding that is constantly recycling, for example at the level of the provider, whether it is the Land Development Agency, the local authority, the housing providers or any local entity, that it is kept recycled whenever there is a surplus, or at the level of a national fund. The important thing is to keep the funding within the sector. This is what we have seen to be really successful in other countries in the EU.
Micheál Carrigy (Longford-Westmeath, Fine Gael)
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I thank Ms Edwards and invite Mr. O'Flynn to make his statement.
Mr. Michael O'Flynn:
I am grateful for the opportunity to engage with the committee on the country's housing emergency. I deliberately use the word "emergency" because that is what it is. I have been saying this for a number of years. We should be dealing with the crisis similarly to the emergency approach we took during Covid. I will keep my comments at a high level rather than getting into details about the group I chaired. During Covid, there was a highly co-ordinated approach across government and we know tough decisions were made in the national interest. Unfortunately, this approach has not been taken to deal with the housing crisis with the result that it is getting more and more challenging.
As someone who passionately believes that we can solve this housing crisis if we take the appropriate steps, it was a privilege to be asked to serve on the Housing Commission. The Housing Commission was a very serious attempt to provide a framework for Government to deal with the crisis in an holistic way. It provided a strategic approach which, if adopted, would over the medium term deal with the serious backlog of more than 300,000 homes, and plan sensibly to address the country's annual targets. I gave my time voluntarily to the commission and I also brought in outside experts on a voluntary basis to help craft solutions. These independent people came from the public and private sectors and were purely motivated by a desire to play their part in helping to bring forward sensible solutions informed by all their experience. Working groups were formed and were particularly effective, allowing key stakeholders to find new perspectives on issues. They facilitated close examination of issues from the perspective of different stakeholders, public and private, considering solutions, stress-testing those solutions and refining them until there was a general agreement that they would work and, importantly, that they would not have unforeseen consequences. The final report of the commission provided a blueprint for creating a sustainable housing system. It brought forward an array of clear recommendations for Government to consider, as it had been tasked to do.
However, despite the fact that it was an independent commission, its report was never formally launched and was largely ignored by Government for far too long. The immediate reaction from some in government was that most of our recommendations were already being carried out. This is simply not the case. A classic example is the proposed recommendations on necessary new housing delivery targets based on the new census data. Despite this, it was almost a year before the need for new housing targets was acknowledged and announced. That is just one example of a lack of emergency thinking and action. I am on the record for some time as saying we should treat the housing shortage as a national emergency. In fact, we should have done so years ago. I chaired a supply group within the Housing Commission and despite bringing forward early recommendations during the commission process, some of these reforms did not see the light of day and are now only emerging despite the state of emergency. The planning reforms are a good example. It is frustrating to see that 14 months after the commission presented its report and two years after early wins were presented for immediate consideration, none of these solutions has been implemented.
One of the reasons the housing crisis has lingered is policy has been created and promoted by people who are not directly involved in delivering private or public sector housing. There is too much political football played with real people's lives and homes. The causes of the crisis were not properly identified and there is a lack of acceptance of the issues that needed to be tackled. People who work on the basis of theory and ideas may be highly educated and mean well, as do people with various political ideals and none. However, unless policies are considered and stress-tested by those who are actually involved in delivering housing, the difficulties are not identified until it is too late and more precious time is lost. The housing delivery oversight executive proposed by the Housing Commission, now being termed the housing activation office, would have provided that broad-based oversight to ensure absolute intolerance of inefficiencies and obstacles, and solutions which are considered by stakeholders and refined before being implemented so they can be made effective. I am not filled by the approach taken to it in recent weeks. We need the involvement of experts from the public and private sectors. We need strong collaboration and trust. We need a Government approach that will take the difficult and brave decisions necessary, in spite of the inevitable hue and cry which will follow. Success was never brought about by taking the easy and populist route.
We have avoided the language of emergency up to now with regard to the housing situation in Ireland but there is undoubtedly an emergency. To the extent that obstacles to effective policy are perceived, emergency legislation may be required to remove them. I sincerely hope that this House will have the courage and conviction to put party politics to one side and work together to give this generation the homes they need at affordable prices that they deserve.
Micheál Carrigy (Longford-Westmeath, Fine Gael)
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Is it agreed that we will publish the opening statements from our witnesses? Agreed. As agreed, we are reducing our speaking time to give an opportunity for all the members of the commission to make an introductory statement. I ask committee members to please keep it to specific questions rather than waiting until four minutes in to ask their question. We will start with five minutes per member. I am also conscious there is another committee coming into this room after us so we have to have our business finished on time, including private session. I would like everyone to get an opportunity. Please keep the questions specific and we will try to get everyone in again if we have time. We will say five minutes for questions and answers. I ask members of the commission also to keep their answers specific and tight. The first speaking slot is Fianna Fáil.
Séamus McGrath (Cork South-Central, Fianna Fail)
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I thank each of the witnesses for coming in and joining us online today. It is greatly appreciated. I thank them for their work on the Housing Commission as well, which is also very much appreciated. It was a very extensive body of work setting out more than 80 recommendations and so on. It was a very substantive piece of work. It is all about housing output, housing activation and how we can stimulate activity rather than getting into the minutiae of other issue relating to housing. I note the language in the report and the language here today is about brave decisions and emergency actions, a radical approach and so on. Undoubtedly we need to take brave decisions and very significant measures, and urgently, to try to grapple with the crisis we are in. We are spending €6.8 billion of public funds on housing, which is the second highest in Europe in terms of our spend. We are spending a lot of public money so the solution has to be in generating private finance and private investment in housing. Of course we can look at more from the State but there are limitations to what the State can do. How do we get increased private investment into housing and activating construction? That is a very broad question. I am not sure who I am asking so I will keep it open to whoever wants to come in. How do we significantly increase private investment? It is nowhere near the level it needs to be at.
Mr. John O'Connor:
I might just step in first. There needs to be certainty and consistency in what is happening and what is in place from a policy point of view, if that can be kept to. One of the big issues affecting delivery is having the infrastructure in place, as many of us have indicated, namely water, wastewater and electricity. They are critical. There is also a need for certainty in the planning system. If somebody is going to build, they need to know that the infrastructure is in place and that they can get planning permission. If they are doing a reasonable development in accordance with the development plan, they need to know they can get permission for that. It can take years and years even to get a development started. I would focus on that.
On our recommendation for a housing delivery oversight office, it is about co-ordination and partnership and stopping this division we talk about between the public sector and the private sector.
We have a housing emergency and we need to get on and remove the barriers. The number of barriers to progressing is too great.
Micheál Carrigy (Longford-Westmeath, Fine Gael)
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I ask Professor Lyons to be as brief and to the point as possible.
Dr. Ronan Lyons:
I will extend Mr. O'Connor's point. In addition to certainty around infrastructure, certainty around use matters. The best performing systems in Europe have much greater clarity around land use. When people buy a site, it is much more obvious what they can build on it and the speed with which something goes from a plan to people moving in is greater. We do not have that in our system. There are a lot of ways in which an individual project can fall off the assembly line. We need to shift that dynamic so that the baseline is how can homes get built rather than asking will the homes be built. That is an extra element of certainty.
Séamus McGrath (Cork South-Central, Fianna Fail)
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There is a strong team coming through in terms of certainty and longer term planning.
Mr. Michael O'Flynn:
The Deputy asked a very good question on what needs to be done. That is what the report was about but, unfortunately, we have not got into the nuts and bolts of the report and the issues that have arisen which do not make development possible.
The report goes into great detail on the issues arising regarding what is holding up development, including planning, lack of zoning and facing up to the housing demand referenced by Professor Lyons. That is what the report is all about, but we have not analysed how we can fix those issues that are hindering supply.
If the market is capable of working, it will supply what is needed. At this moment in time, we have fundamental shortfalls. We have taken a number of years to face up to the numbers and are taking an awful long time to zone appropriate lands, whether serviced or serviceable. We do not have the right infrastructure.
To answer the Deputy's question, there are many issues but they all go back to whether it is viable or possible for the market to deliver. The market cannot deliver if we have obstacles in front of it. There are many obstacles, but the report goes into great detail on recommendations. The oversight executive is a key recommendation aimed at untangling the major issues preventing the supply the Deputy inquired about.
Mr. David O'Connor:
There is a chart on page 47 of the report which outlines two scenarios pertaining to what private and local authority developments have to go through in order to get planning permission or to get onto site. Both are extremely complicated. To refer to Michael O'Flynn's last point on the oversight executive, an oversight executive could consider this from a programme point of view. There are a whole lot of issues that require one step after another which could be amalgamated. If a programme or project management mind was put to that, the process could be systemised and made far more efficient. I wanted to mention that example.
Micheál Carrigy (Longford-Westmeath, Fine Gael)
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We met the CCMA a couple of weeks ago and that was one of the issues that came up before today's meeting, namely stretching it out to two and a half or three years rather than the 59 weeks it should take.
Séamus McGrath (Cork South-Central, Fianna Fail)
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My question was broad and goes to the heart of the report in terms of a series of different actions. I hope to come back in again later.
Eoin Ó Broin (Dublin Mid West, Sinn Fein)
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The Chair will have to toughen up if he wants to keep us to our seven minutes. I thank the witnesses for all of the work they have done, as well as that done by their colleagues and all of the other participants in producing the report. It is not possible for us to get into all of the detail in one session. It might be very useful for the committee, as we go through other modules, to take the opportunity to invite the commission to send somebody in when we are discussing individual issues. This should not be a one-off process but rather a rolling discussion.
I have specific questions for specific people. With respect to the deficit, given what Professor Lyons said and based on the commission's report, what does he believe is the annual average number of new homes we will need from 2026 to 2030 to meet that deficit?
Professor Norris correctly highlighted that at least 20% of all stock should be social and cost rental and a lot of that should be front-loaded. It is a follow-on question from the one I asked of Professor Lyons. What does that mean in terms of the number of social and cost-rental units we will need on average from 2025 to 2030? I ask her to put a number on that.
Mr. O'Flynn mentioned the housing delivery oversight executive and his concern around the housing activation office. Can he tell us what he thinks is missing from what he heard from Government on the activation office from the proposals the commission made? What needs to be changed in order for the office to be able to do what is required?
If there is time, I will ask a final question of Professor Lyons and Professor Norris. They have different views on rent reform, which is fine. Given what they heard today, can they give us a sense of how their different recommendations in the commission's majority and minority reports relate to what they have heard on RPZ reform today? Perhaps we could take the questions in that order.
Dr. Ronan Lyons:
To be completely blunt, the housing deficit is of such scale I do not think there is any realistic scenario in which it is tackled in five years. We are talking probably in the order of 300,000 homes now. Even just addressing the housing deficit in the space of five years, as per the Deputy's questions, would require 60,000 homes per year. There is ongoing need on top of that. If we wanted to address the deficit as quickly as that, we would need 85,000 to 100,000 homes per year. That is the strict answer to the Deputy's question. I do not think the system is able to do that.
By way of finishing my answer, we can look at examples like Sweden's miljonprogrammet project, whereby a million homes were built in the space of ten years with significant state support to address the housing deficit. There are examples of that. Sweden's deficit was, per capita, slightly smaller than ours, but it built homes over ten years. I think five years is too fast.
Professor Michelle Norris:
In terms of doubling the supply of social and cost-rental housing, depending on whether we deliver them over 20 or ten years, it would require 8,000 to 10,000 units per year over 20 years and twice that over ten years. It is a substantial and ambitious programme. We felt this would have the potential to take significant numbers of households out of the private rental market. There are about 55,000 HAP recipients at the moment.
Eoin Ó Broin (Dublin Mid West, Sinn Fein)
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Just to be clear, if this was addressed over ten years, what would be the total quantum of average of social and cost-rental units we would need every year?
Eoin Ó Broin (Dublin Mid West, Sinn Fein)
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Social and cost rental.
Mr. Michael O'Flynn:
I thank the Deputy. In a nutshell, we saw the housing delivery oversight executive, as we call it and which has now graduated into being the activation office, as meaning that activation suggests something is there and we need to make it happen. That is not the case.
We saw this as a body that would be time limited and established in legislation in order to give it the authority it needs to identify and address the blockages and make things happen across the sector, whether that involves zoning, high delivery zones, infrastructure deficiencies, water, wastewater or utilities. This was a structure that would be introduced to change things immediately. It would not be part of the existing system, but needed to have public and private input. I anticipated there would be secondments from public authorities into a special unit.
At the time, we anticipated it being in the Taoiseach's office so that it would operate across Departments and make sure that immediate provision of housing would happen where it was not but should be happening and we would also deal with the shortage of zonings, investment, infrastructure and all that goes with that. That is very different from what is now being suggested. It is to be hoped that what is now being suggested will happen and bring about some of the changes we aspire to in the Housing Commission.
Dr. Ronan Lyons:
To clarify, it was not a minority opinion per se on rent control. It was a footnote for three commissioners where we had a slight difference of opinion. While it is unfortunate the measures are being released more or less as we speak and, therefore, clashing with this meeting, from what we have heard, the vacancy decontrol aspect will reduce some of the harmful effects of rent pressure zones. When a tenant leaves voluntarily, there is an ability to recoup costs. Costs incurred by maintenance can be gotten back in the rent, which is an important lever. When comparing the systems of carry-over rents versus resetting rents, systems with resetting rents typically have a better-performing rental sector. While that is a bit of a simplification, it is true on average. Of course, there is a lot more detail in these measures. The devil may be in the detail. My sense from what has been released so far is that vacancy decontrol is the single most important change being introduced, both for new and existing leases.
Professor Michelle Norris:
From my perspective, there was a consensus among the entire commission that the system of rent pressure zones needed reform. It was introduced as an emergency measure, rather than something intended to be in place long term. It is not possible under the formula for extending RPZs to extend them nationwide. There are a lot of anomalies around the country. I am sure TDs and Senators will be aware of areas not covered by the zones. We also felt that the pegging of rent increases at the flat rate of 2% was not a good system and discouraged supply. We were unclear about the rationale for the particular 2% level. There was consensus that the system needed to be reformed.
The majority of members felt it should be replaced with a reference rent system. In our view, if there was going to be comprehensive reform of rent control, there needed to be a long-term, sustainable alternative put in place. The reference rent model has a number of advantageous. It is used effectively in other European countries where there are high levels of private rented housing. If designed effectively, it should not stymie supply significantly. Obviously, there is a trade-off between the rights of tenants to affordability and the interests of landlords. It is about balancing them. We felt this was a balanced solution. Our idea was that the system would be designed and managed by the Residential Tenancies Board or any replacement organisation. It could be designed to reflect the type of information it collects currently and designed strategically, reviewed and extended to achieve the kind of policy outcomes the Government prioritises. For instance, it could allow landlords who invest in a property to improve the BER rating to increase the rent. We felt that an evidence-based model, that would be within the remit of the RTB and reviewed regularly based on a review of market evidence, would help depoliticise the rental system and also provide certainty for landlords and tenants long term.
We also recommended that rent control be applied at property level and continued from tenancy to tenancy. This was quite a specific recommendation of the majority of commission members, given that the supply shortage is so critical and many rents, particularly rents from landlords providing accommodation long term to vulnerable households, such as households on HAP, are well below mark rate. We were concerned that landlords would have a strong incentive to terminate such tenancies on that basis. That does not mean this measure would be permanent, however. It could be reviewed as supply increased.
Micheál Carrigy (Longford-Westmeath, Fine Gael)
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I ask members and witnesses to be conscious of the time in order that everyone will get an opportunity to ask questions. The next slot is Fine Gael's. I call Deputy Cooney.
Joe Cooney (Clare, Fine Gael)
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I welcome the witnesses. I have read the report and the recommendations with interest. I agree with Mr. O’Flynn that we have a serious crisis on our hands. While a lot of issues need to be sorted to get out of the emergency we are in, I wish to focus on one. Other members brought up different issues but the one I wish to focus on is intensifying reuse and retrofitting of vacant and derelict dwellings in rural Ireland. The vacant and derelict home scheme was introduced in 2022. It has been successful, with 2,000 homes brought back into use up until March and three times that number approved for grant funding going forward, which is simply fantastic. However, as someone who was involved in the construction sector, I am concerned about its continued success going forward. We all know the costs of construction have increased. Concrete products are up by almost 21%. Joinery costs, windows and doors, etc., are up by 25%. The costs of all types of insulation have doubled since 2022. This is a serious concern. These increases reduce the value of the grant and pose a real risk to its future attractiveness and continued success.
I wish to hear the witnesses’ thoughts on a number of matters. First, given the number of derelict properties in rural areas and in our towns and villages, and the potential to rebuild these in a timely manner, should this committee advise the Government to increase the grant in line with construction costs? Second, I hear from people who are using the grant to support building a first home, either for themselves or for their children. The grant is paid on completion. Managing the cash flow is not easy. The scheme should be paid on a stage payment basis. I am interested in the witnesses’ opinions in that regard. Third, do they have any comment to make on inflation in the construction industry generally and its impact on housing delivery?
Mr. John O'Connor:
I will address the first part. I am not the best person to answer questions on inflation in the construction industry. The commission was of the view that it is of critical importance that vacant properties are brought back into use and that, even where a property has been provided for the first time, it is occupied and utilised quickly. The commission fully supports that view. The commission fully supported the grants for derelict or vacant properties and it would fully support the Deputy in increasing those grants in line with construction inflation. To make it work efficiently, resources must be provided by the local authorities to approve those grants. With regard to the stage payments proposal, commission members support that also to facilitate people. We need to bring vacant property back into use and reduce it as much as possible because they are available. We 100% support that. I welcome any other member who wishes to speak to construction inflation.
Mr. David O'Connor:
The Deputy has touched on something that is important in revitalising our towns, villages and rural areas. It has been a great success. We see the phenomena he is talking about. There are a few things in this regard. There is a danger in raising the grant because it might contribute to inflation, unfortunately. One idea that might be helpful is providing an initial part of the grant for a feasibility study at an early stage. That could bring down the cost of the overall package that is being proposed to get the organisation of the refurbishment done better. If someone is brought in to help people do a feasibility study and then the project is formed around that study, costs could be controlled more effectively. There is definitely an issue around cost. One of our recommendations in the report is for us to be provided with more accurate information on building costs in general.
Mr. Michael O'Flynn:
I support what Mr. O’Connor has said. He has a background in design and understands very well issues in respect of existing properties. I absolutely agree with what the Deputy is suggesting.
It is awful to drive through villages and towns and to see derelict properties when all the infrastructure that is necessary for those properties to operate is there.
To go into the specifics of the Deputy's questions, if I recall them correctly, the grants should be related to the scale of the work that needs to be done. There has to be some basis of costs versus finished product. I have advised people who have come to me about vacant properties. At the end of the day, someone cannot end up spending more money than what something is worth, and that is a real issue. From a societal point of view, we should refurbish and enable those properties to be occupied.
I completely agree with the Deputy on cash flow. If a percentage grant is approved or applicable, there should be some system found to help with stages and to make that situation easier for someone to have a loan, the grant and the cash flow to get from start to finish. It is the big jump stopping people doing what they simply cannot afford or expect financial institution to do for them because it is dependent on the final outcome and the final cost result.
On inflation, I am sorry that construction cost inflation is only going one direction, as he probably knows. People keep thinking and talking about how material costs will come down and extraordinary things will happen. They will not. We will just have to become more efficient in what we do and how we do it, with design efficiencies and so on. I cannot offer him any comfort in that regard.
Rory Hearne (Dublin North-West, Social Democrats)
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I thank the members of the Housing Commission who are present. It is great to have them here. I have gone through the report in detail and it is very interesting from an academic, political and social point of view. It is a pity there has not been more engagement with it. While I clearly would not agree with a certain amount in it, there is much that I do agree with.
I have many questions for the witnesses but unfortunately we do not have the time. I will try to go through a couple of them quickly. First, why does the chair think there has been such reticence from the Department of housing to engage with this report in any serious way? Second, does he see the Department and the Government taking an emergency response in its actions?
I have a question for Dr. Lyons on rents and the rental approach. What is his assessment of the sustainability of current rent levels, economically and socially? What sort of numbers does he think we will see as a result of the new measures announced today in terms of increased supply? At what point does he think rents are likely to fall?
Regarding social housing, one of the key recommendations in the report is to give local authorities increased capacity. What does Professor Norris think is needed in that regard? Perhaps she could spell out a little about the regional local authority organisations she mentioned. How can we get to that point of delivering 20,000 social and cost-rental homes, which is clearly what we need?
I have another question for the chair on affordable housing and affordable rental. How do we get genuinely affordable housing delivered and what does he think is key to that?
There is a figure thrown around that we need €20 billion but it is also in the report that if we had less density, only €16 billion would be required. Perhaps someone could comment on that.
Finally, on the right to housing, why has there been no engagement on this? The fact there was a minority report on the right to housing shows that we need to be honest - I am sure Mr. O’Flynn will come in on this - that there are different interests in housing. This is glossed over a lot. Banks want higher house prices so they can provide higher mortgages. Institutional investors want higher rents so they can increase their profits. Builders and developers want higher house prices so they can increase their profits. We should not pretend otherwise. This is the reality. That is why we need the State to regulate, intervene and deliver. Perhaps the witnesses could comment on this. Has our policy been too orientated towards trying to incentive the market rather than looking at what the State itself should be doing?
Micheál Carrigy (Longford-Westmeath, Fine Gael)
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Many questions were put but we have very little time to get answers. I ask each witness to answer them quickly please.
Mr. John O'Connor:
To answer the Deputy’s questions directed towards me briefly, initially, the Department had a knee-jerk reaction to the report. More engagement with commission members would definitely have been more beneficial to understand the recommendations of the report. It has been getting more traction in the past number of months but it is important for engagement to improve.
On the affordability issue, affordability goes across everybody on different income levels. Regarding affordable purchase and cost-rental housing, there is a lot of focus on initial affordability. People talk about the 30% or 35%. What there is not sufficient discussion on, which we have covered in the report, is long-term affordability. If someone is going into affordable purchase or cost-rental housing, they want affordability. It might be a significant portion of someone’s income. However, it needs to decrease to 20% or 15% of a household’s income over time. Long-term affordability is more important than the initial affordability.
Dr. Ronan Lyons:
I thank the Deputy for the question. Rents are currently at a very high level, and that can be measured in many different ways. It can be measured based on how much they have changed over the past five, ten or 15 years, compared with 2007 or compared with incomes. Rents are very high and it is impacting everyday life in a number of ways, including people’s spending money but also job creation. Jobs are not being created because rents are too high and rental availability is too low.
We need to see the exact details of the changes to rent controls that have been proposed. They are only coming out this afternoon. I will take an educated guess as to what will be the impact based on what we have heard so far. What the country needs year to year is about – again, I will give ranges because we need to reflect the uncertainty – 10,000 to 15,000 rental homes built in the greater Dublin area every year, and probably 15,000 rental homes outside the greater Dublin area every year. We are close to zero at the moment on both fronts. I think Dublin is at 2,000 or 3,000, and falling. Will these changes have an impact in Dublin? Possibly, yes. I think we will see projects in the pipeline. Again, it depends a little bit on the specifics. Will we see a change outside Dublin? I would be very surprised if there is any change in the supply pipeline outside Dublin, with maybe one or two exceptions, namely, Cork and Galway. That is because of the viability challenge. Affordability and viability are, unfortunately, intertwined, and there is something of a paradox there. Costs are so high that it is not viable to build housing in many parts of the country even though affordability is so poor.
I was chair of the minority report, so I am happy to come back on that. I answered the first question, so I will leave it there for the moment.
Professor Michelle Norris:
To answer the Deputy’s question on the local authority housing organisations we proposed, the view of the commission was that there are huge impediments to increasing the social housing output. There is an impediment in respect of land supply. The Land Development Agency needs to take a more active role in assembling land banks to give out to other social housing providers rather than solely developing themselves to address that. There is a finance capacity issue because the rules around giving finance to local authorities are extremely cumbersome. There is then a capacity issue because local authorities are delivering in very challenging environments. Regulatory environments and planning are very challenging and so on. Local authorities are relatively small organisations to have to deliver in this capacity. The idea of local authority housing organisations is that they are essentially shared service organisations between groups of local authorities. For example, Laois and Offaly county councils might set one up.
This would own the stock on their behalf and do new development. The rental income would go into the new organisation which would allow it to raise debt to build the housing rather than solely relying on the Department of housing. It would also allow it to take on the expert staff it needs to deliver housing - the planners, quantity surveyors, architects, etc. This model is very widely used around Europe. Ireland is very unusual in Europe in that councils are directly involved in housing delivery. In most countries it is done by housing associations - we call them AHBs here - or by municipal housing organisations. It is vital to have more local authority delivery of housing if we are to increase the output. Even though AHBs do a really valuable job, we are reliant on a very small number of them. Three AHBs are doing a huge amount of the delivery. We need to get councils back in the game and we feel this restructuring would address the challenges they face.
Micheál Carrigy (Longford-Westmeath, Fine Gael)
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We have gone way over time because there were so many questions. I want to bring in Deputy Stanley.
Micheál Carrigy (Longford-Westmeath, Fine Gael)
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If we get an opportunity, I can come back to Mr. O'Flynn.
Brian Stanley (Laois, Independent)
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I welcome the members of the Housing Commission and I thank them for their work, much of which I agree with but some of which I do not. I know there was not total agreement among all the members of the commission; that is the world we live in.
My first question is for Ms King. I read with interest the recommendations regarding what should happen with private rented accommodation. Does she think these measures will work? Will they be inflationary? Page 16 of the report states: "Regulate market rents fairly and effectively by reforming the current system of rent regulation and establishing a system of ‘Reference Rents’." I ask Ms King to explain what is meant by that. I am very much open to that idea, which might better reflect what the rent should be in a particular area for a particular type of house, more so than just 2% or 0% depending on the site you are on.
There is one thing that a report like this will not deal with but it is widespread. How do we halt rent top-ups that do not figure in rent reports or do not figure on the books anywhere?
Ms Patricia King:
I thank the Deputy for the question. Rent was very much Professor Norris's piece in the commission. The reference rent is built on the average rents for apartments or houses within the same locality. The bottom line from the perspective of the commission members was to inject and ensure ongoing and sustainable fairness in the system so that it was not just about dealing with a particular moment in time. It was to be an ongoing system that could be regulated and would deal with the actual rent for the comparable units within the same locality. It is crucial for regulating the rent increases and safeguarding the tenants' rights. Professor Norris might like to give the commission's general perspective on the rent.
Brian Stanley (Laois, Independent)
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Would it specifically take account of energy rating and property size? I ask Ms King to respond briefly because I have very little time.
Brian Stanley (Laois, Independent)
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That is all I need to know on that. This is my last question on reference rents. Is there a limit? Would increases be linked to inflation each year?
Brian Stanley (Laois, Independent)
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How should top-ups be halted? Would it require more powers for the RTB? As we know, tenants are reluctant to complain.
Brian Stanley (Laois, Independent)
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That is one form of top-up. There are other forms of top-up that do not show in rent agreements. It is quite common.
Professor Michelle Norris:
Our view was that there needs to be more active regulation of the rental sector. On the one hand, there have been an unbelievable number of changes to rent regulations which have undermined the confidence of investors. On the other hand, the actual enforcement of many of these changes is extremely weak. We felt that the Residential Tenancies Board needs to take a more active approach to identifying non-registered landlords and a more active approach to enforcement.
Brian Stanley (Laois, Independent)
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Many of these are registered, but there is a side element to it.
Brian Stanley (Laois, Independent)
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Would that require a better resourced RTB?
Ms Patricia King:
The standards within the rental sector exercised the commission considerably. I know the Deputy would have an interest in that. The standards are something that are not, dare I use the word, policed well at all. The commission made a recommendation in that regard to try to reinforce the point so that tenants can be assured of a standard applying to the rental property.
Brian Stanley (Laois, Independent)
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Again, I will ask Ms King my initial questions. Will these measures work? Will they be inflationary? The fact that tenancies are changing from one tenancy to the next-----
Brian Stanley (Laois, Independent)
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I would have thought that Ms King would have been the right person.
Brian Stanley (Laois, Independent)
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It would be a great person who would go there.
Micheál Carrigy (Longford-Westmeath, Fine Gael)
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There is only one person to give an answer on that.
Brian Stanley (Laois, Independent)
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Does Professor Norris want to give an answer on that?
Brian Stanley (Laois, Independent)
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When tenancies change the same rules apply.
Professor Michelle Norris:
Our concern was that there would be a strong incentive for landlords to terminate the tenancy, particularly where the rent is way below the market rent. I understand the argument about new supply of private rental accommodation which is very important. However, it is very important to retain existing supply. In particular, small landlords play a vital role in housing people through HAP. Many of those rents are now below market rents if they have been providing long-term accommodation. I am concerned that the system being proposed disincentivises this kind of long-term accommodation, which is very important.
Brian Stanley (Laois, Independent)
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Would that mean it could go more towards the big-investor landlord? It may be more favourable to them than to small landlords.
Brian Stanley (Laois, Independent)
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About 50% of accommodation is provided by small landlords.
Brian Stanley (Laois, Independent)
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Dr. Lyons might like to answer that.
Dr. Ronan Lyons:
I think smaller landlords may provide an even larger share.
It is important to view the market in terms of movers and stayers. The stayers have enjoyed significant protections but those unfortunate enough to be on the open market have borne the brunt. In the cases of Limerick and Galway, I believe open market rents are now three times what they were in 2011. Sitting tenants have seen a much smaller increase. Vacancy decontrol will reduce those inequalities a bit. It relates to how inflation is measured. When measuring inflation for sitting tenants, it will probably go up whereas for those on the open market it will probably go down.
Aubrey McCarthy (Independent)
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I thank the members of the commission for their presentation. For those who do not know, I am a new Senator but I have been involved in homelessness and housing for the last 20 years. When the commission was set up in December 2021, I was rather excited. I always keep a tab on the homeless figures in my office. At that stage, the figure was 8,914, with 2,400 of those being children. Now that we have the report, the homeless figures have doubled to 15,580, including 4,700 children.
The commission's report's overview states: "Housing must be a unique national priority, supporting social cohesion and economic development." The commission started in December 2021 and put in two and a half years of good work. We have now gone a year beyond that. I heard the witness who is appearing remotely say that hundreds of meetings took place and all the rest. Why have none of the 83 findings been implemented? Was there nothing that could be implemented which would make a difference to the homeless figures we are dealing with every day?
We seem to have a wonderful collection of experts. They all have a fantastic CV but it seems, culturally, we are not working together? Whether it is governmental Departments or whatever, is there a reason for that? Do they think, in Ireland, we cannot seem to solve the housing and it is something culturally?
Third, if they were to identify one recommendation from the findings that we could implement in 2025 which could make the difference, what would that recommendation be and what is stopping us?
Mr. John O'Connor:
I will start. I thank the Senator. In terms of picking out one recommendation relevant to the area the Senator speaking about, he has highlighted the increase in child homelessness over the past number of years. We made a number of recommendations in relation to homelessness, but one was "Implement specific measures to end child homelessness." We outlined a number of actions. What we were asking there for, with all the issues in relation to homelessness, is that we should not have a situation where children are homeless. Often we talk about child homelessness as part of the general homelessness and we wanted specific action to address that.
On the question of working together, we need, across everything and particularly in the housing system, for Departments and the public and private sectors to work together. It can work if we all get focused on a common goal and we move away from what David O'Connor was talking about earlier, about everybody doing their own bits. We have to find a way. It is not necessarily unique to Ireland - it is the same in other countries - but we all need to get our shoulders to the wheel in relation to housing.
I see Sorcha Edwards wants to come in.
Micheál Carrigy (Longford-Westmeath, Fine Gael)
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Dr. Lyons had indicated he was coming in first.
Dr. Ronan Lyons:
On whether we are somehow unique in Ireland on this, the key point to note is that Ireland is the only country - not that population growth is the only determinant of housing requirement - in Europe to have faster population growth this century than last century. The context is different. We are used to stable, and often falling, population and we are now in rising population whereas other European countries had rapidly-rising populations and now either slowly-rising or falling populations. That is a unique context. We are not culturally somehow inadequate in relation to solving it. It is the context is different. We have conservative population projections. Layering on top of that, the housing targets were, until too recently, treated as ceilings - that one should not go above this number. That has only changed in the past little while. They are three elements of understanding how we have got ten to 12 years into a housing shortage.
Aubrey McCarthy (Independent)
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I hear what Dr. Lyons is saying but if he looks at the Covid crisis and the 100,000 Ukrainians coming into Ireland, we managed to work at those. All of the people got together, all of the experts such as Dr. Lyons, and we fixed it. Housing, it seems, is one area we are not able to fix. If we are able to house 100,000 Ukrainians with the click of a finger, and the same with Covid, the housing numbers have doubled since the commission was put together. That is disappointing. Certainly, I run the Lighthouse Homeless Café in Dublin. I see the queues every night. The reality of each of those numbers is a life and a family. What they propose is excellent but I hope it is not another book to read.
Micheál Carrigy (Longford-Westmeath, Fine Gael)
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I will let in Ms Edwards. She had indicated she wanted to come in on that as well.
Ms Sorcha Edwards:
With housing, there are no quick fixes. Obviously, homelessness is even more complex because you need different actors to work together. It is not only about a short term for a year. If you want to maintain tenancies, you also need to have wraparound care for those with complex needs.
In terms of quick things we can do, if I were looking at this, also at European level, it would be enable off-balance sheet financing for AHBs and the complex debt rules that local authorities have that Professor Michelle Norris mentioned earlier. It would be to quickly address those entities that are ready to deliver affordable housing and also housing for homelessness and to really listen to them and the problems they have with drawing down finance even when there is finance available because of debt rules or balance sheet rules.
Mr. Michael O'Flynn:
Senator McCarthy asked a valid question. The reality of the situation is we have a report that could fix the housing crisis. It will not fix it overnight. There are several elements of that report that could have been implemented by now. We are where we are but, quite honestly, if the Senator wants me to pick out one item, I would pick out the oversight executive to be given much stronger powers to make things happen immediately. I am very worried that we are slowly not dealing with the crisis that we have in front of us. The Senator is asking us what can we do. We can do much more much more quickly, if we put our minds to it and collaborate as a group.
To answer the last question that I did not get a chance to, a State construction company, with respect to Deputy Hearne, will not solve any problem. It will actually make the situation worse. I am happy to debate that, if we have time at the end.
Micheál Carrigy (Longford-Westmeath, Fine Gael)
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I thank Mr. O'Flynn. The next slot is a Fianna Fáil slot. I call Deputy Séamus McGrath.
Séamus McGrath (Cork South-Central, Fianna Fail)
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How much time have I got?
Micheál Carrigy (Longford-Westmeath, Fine Gael)
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Four minutes.
Séamus McGrath (Cork South-Central, Fianna Fail)
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I will try and focus on two specific items, if I can.
I will go back to Dr. Lyons first. Deputy Ó Broin, in terms of the scale of the challenge, stated that it is not realistic to turn the corner in five years necessarily but if you take away the deficit, what is the annual demand for housing? What would Dr. Lyons put the figure at? Setting aside the deficit, what is the here-and-now demand per annum for housing across the board?
Dr. Ronan Lyons:
In the report, we go into housing requirements, with and without the deficit. The deficit at the time of the date of the report was up to 250,000 homes. The total number of homes needed by mid-century was, depending on the scenario, between 1.4 million and 1.9 million. Therefore, the deficit is huge now but it is small compared to the need that will accrue over the next 30 years. One can take the 250,000 off and one can still have scenarios - I would say 300,000 now - where the housing requirement would be 50,000 homes to 60,000 homes a year with no deficit.
Séamus McGrath (Cork South-Central, Fianna Fail)
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Therefore, the deficit is growing.
Séamus McGrath (Cork South-Central, Fianna Fail)
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The output now is not reaching the demand now and, therefore, the deficit is growing. That is the scale of the challenge.
Ms Patricia King:
Sometimes there is an over-complicated response put on this which does not necessarily address it. In our report, we said a reset was required. What we mean by that, not to over-complicate it, is lower-income people are more likely to be dependent on the social, AHB and affordable sectors to deliver homes for them. Believe it or not, that category of people is growing. Our labour market has gone to over 2 million and yet one worker in five is a low-income worker. That group of people is expanding and we are sitting in a housing Department worrying about four steps that could take up to three years to get to the other end of it while this queue for the houses is growing. When we said put in emergency measures, we meant take a look at those four steps, stop the risk aversion and say, "What can we do?", only on the public sector side of delivering housing because when one starts delivering at scale on the public side, one will start to deal with the issues on the private sector side where people at middle and higher incomes are in the market for houses. We said, "Put in emergency measures", to stop those obstacles. The points that are made about the oversight executive, etc., would help to do that.
Séamus McGrath (Cork South-Central, Fianna Fail)
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My time is going here, if Ms King does not mind.
Séamus McGrath (Cork South-Central, Fianna Fail)
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I am sorry for interrupting Ms King. The scale of the issue is one thing but I wanted to focus on apartment building because if we are to achieve anywhere near the kind of output we need, we have to get development of density. We need traditional houses, semi-detached family homes, etc., but we also need apartment blocks to start happening, and they are not happening. Across Europe, apartments feature much more strongly in terms of housing output than they do in Ireland. What are the three top things we need to do to get apartments moving? I might ask Mr. Michael O'Flynn to comment on that as a builder.
I know that in Cork he focuses more on housing.
Mr. Michael O'Flynn:
No, we have built many apartments in Dublin and Cork and are building them at the moment. Apartment building is very challenging at this moment in time because we have such viability issues that small changes will not make any difference. The Government has brought in various initiatives, which are very plausible. The simple fact is that as we do not have a viable apartment business where we can build apartments and sell them, they need to be subsidised. How to deal with that situation and what amount of subsidy is required? The subsidy is quite large. There are schemes like croí cónaithe and Project Tosaigh but the reality is that we need a suite of measures to make apartments more viable. We probably are talking about not having any VAT on apartments. We probably will need to take VAT off a lot of the chain as well.
I reiterate that we have a serious viability issue. We need to look at densities. We need to look at how we can make densities more viable for city living. Apartments are very expensive. We have a very highly regulated apartment design instruction, which I do not suggest we should change. When all of those situations exist then the dial cannot be changed overnight. It will be very difficult to change the dial by any one measure. It will need several measures, including serious subsidisation.
I am loath to mention tax breaks because people will start talking about profit and developers. The reality is that we, as a business, need viable product. If we have viable product then we can develop. If we cannot get viable product then we cannot finance it and if we cannot finance it then it will not happen. We need to look at an open book approach to apartment costs and delivery, and all of us get around the table and accept these are the costs, how can we make them work and how can it be funded.
We need more State funding involved in financing and we need cheaper financing. I cannot identify one issue that will be the silver bullet; it is a whole range of issues.
Thomas Gould (Cork North-Central, Sinn Fein)
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My first question is for Professor Norris. I have a big interest in social housing. It is important that we build social housing, especially for a lot of the people I represent. At the same time as the housing crisis, I have seen a neglect in housing maintenance and a lack of funding for housing that already exists. This has resulted in people having to live in terrible conditions where the houses have mould, leaks and do not reach energy efficiency standards. There are children growing up in these types of homes. This issue has been covered and touched on in the report. What reforms in funding would Professor Norris like to see coming from local authorities to ensure that the lifespan of existing housing stock is kept as long as possible while retaining a high standard of quality?
Professor Michelle Norris:
We looked at this issue in a good bit of depth in the report. It is an open secret for people who are involved in the social housing sector that there are some significant problems with standards in the local authority housing sector. Part of this is fundamentally because local authorities, particularly in urban areas, do not have adequate revenue from rents to maintain dwellings. In rural areas where there are semi-detached and detached houses the maintenance costs are generally lower. In urban areas where flat complexes were built in the 1950s, the maintenance costs are higher. The income that local authorities get from the differential rents or income-related rents just is not enough. That means there is not adequate upgrading on an ongoing basis of dwellings. It is actually much more expensive in the long term because we then need to spend a lot of money on completely renovating them in the end.
We suggested, to reform the system, that rents be pegged to the costs of management, maintenance and delivery. We also suggested that tenants be given a housing allowance, like HAP, to help them pay the rent if they could not afford to do so. Such initiatives would provide local authorities with a guaranteed stream of revenue to maintain the dwellings.
We also suggested that local authorities be subject to RTB regulation, including independent inspections as currently they are the only part of the housing sector that is not regulated.
Thomas Gould (Cork North-Central, Sinn Fein)
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I support that suggestion because landlords must deal with the RTB, which is only right and proper, and then local authorities are leaving people in houses, which are owned by the State, in unbelievable conditions. Last night, I got a phone call from a man who had water pouring through his roof and down through the light fittings in the house. He told me that the council has called out to him a number of times. However, he rang me at 9 o'clock last night because he was afraid to switch on a light in case he would be electrocuted. That is an example of some of the queries that Members are dealing with.
My next question is for Ms King. Earlier she mentioned how we are going to deal with social housing and deliver the amount of social housing required. She also mentioned that even though more people are working there are more people earning a low income. The amount of social housing being provided is nowhere near what is needed.
Ms Patricia King:
In response to the Deputy, in the public consultation we met several of the CEOs of local authorities, AHB managers and so on. First, they need confidence that if they are going to embark upon a project of X number of local authority houses in their county that they will get the required funding. They need to have confidence that they can bring a project from A to Z in a reasonable period and that they will get the money for the project. Several of these people told us that they were not confident that would happen. They were also very animated, in some cases, about the various steps that must be taken, which is an issue we have mentioned before and I will not repeat it. So from conception to the birth of a project it could take anything from four to six years. Such a situation is unacceptable and unnecessary. We included in the commission report that there should be an emergency response because when you know that that is the case, and know the system is not delivering the required output - I am talking merely about social housing as the Deputy has asked - then you have to put in a system that will work. We said to the people concerned, who are involved in all of that, to get their heads together and put this emergency in place in order that they can build local authority housing at scale, which will then start to alleviate all the issues on the other side, including HAP. I mention HAP because it is used as a crutch to provide social housing and interferes with the private rental market, and has done for quite some time.
The Deputy asked me what is causing the hold-up. I do not know. Michael O'Flynn has explained about the oversight executive and how that would work. It seemed to the commission that the only way to resolve the matter was to put in that system, which would then recognise where obstacles exist and try to remove them. Some of those obstacles are only small and some of them are large.
Thomas Gould (Cork North-Central, Sinn Fein)
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I appreciate the honesty. My next questions are for Mr. O'Flynn and Michael and I probably disagree politically. The report calls for a radical reset. Today, Michael has said that housing is an emergency, needs to be treated like an emergency with the introduction of legislation and the oversight directive needs to be implemented right now. They were his words.
Mr. Michael O'Flynn:
Yes, the Deputy has said it. We are not dealing with the crisis in front of us. We are talking about it; we are playing political football with it. We just need to accept that people desperately need housing that they can afford. We have identified the issues in the commission's report from an expert group of people who are involved in the industry - public and private. So lots of voluntary people got involved. We have the answers if there is an appetite within the political system to deal with it. If there is an appetite there then we can fix housing but if there is not then we will keep kicking the can down the road.
Paula Butterly (Louth, Fine Gael)
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I apologise that I was not here to hear the opening statements. I have listened with interest and every question I had has gone out the window or another Deputy has asked it. I might go around the houses a little bit but I ask our guests to stick with me as I try to form my questions.
First and foremost, I will go back to the different steps that we must take and to address this as an emergency. My curiosity has always been around planning, how laborious it is, the different stages and how obstructive it can be at the same time.
I also noted the comments on working with the local authorities and staffing them correctly. I firmly believe that people often know the map but do not know the territory. If staffed and funded correctly, our local authorities are the best placed to deal with not just social housing but also planning applications for private housing. My next question is possibly for Mr. O'Flynn. Were obstacles removed and were local authorities allowed to make those decisions, how quickly would that develop the process? Does Mr. O'Flynn understand? Leaving aside the statutory timelines, how much quicker would the process be?
I come from a small but densely populated county, County Louth. Once upon a time, the small or medium-sized builder was the man - I will say "man" because there are still too few females in the industry - who built the one-off houses in the countryside. It was such builders who built the ten or 15 houses in the villages or just outside the towns. This is no longer a feature because, at the moment, they have serious difficulties with financing. They are actually being subcontracted to work on bigger jobs by the larger companies. That is fine. I have no problem with companies making a profit. On that basis, what are the witnesses' thoughts on the role of banks? We had representatives of the Central Bank in here two weeks ago and its approach is very much a prudent and hands-off one, that is, it does not interfere with the process. However, small and medium-sized builders cannot access finance and therefore the only deal in town is a local authority deal. That is hampering young people and young professionals in my area who wish to build their own homes because there is nobody available to build those homes.
On skilled labour, we very often get queries in respect of visas. It seems to be recognised that the skilled labour force we once had is no longer there. How quickly could we get them home? Are we addressing the issue of the labour force required to build these houses and reach the targets?
Mr. David O'Connor:
I thank the Deputy very much for her question. It might be a little bit enlightening if I reminded people of my opening statement, which the Deputy unfortunately missed. I was an architect from the mid-seventies. I was part of some big organisations, for example, Dublin City Council, or Dublin Corporation as it was at the time, that were turning out thousands of houses per annum up until the early nineties. We had the engine to do it. That has largely dissipated now. On getting from the concept for a scheme to approval from the council, as there was no Part 8 in those days once the council approved it, it went ahead and would go out to tender.
In my time in Fingal County Council, we had exactly the phenomenon the Deputy has described. We had small builders whom we nurtured and who built small groups of eight or ten houses, the old-fashioned county council cottages, as they were called, up until the late nineties. They were a valuable resource. I have contact with local authorities around the country that deal with the kind of builders the Deputy has spoken about who have extreme problems in trying to raise money. The home-building finance agency was designed to finance those areas and that particular cohort of housing. However, the constraints imposed on this finance mean that some of these small builders have to go elsewhere for finance, which is then added onto the cost of the houses local authorities have to buy. The system is disconnected. We keep going back to this idea of looking at the whole barrel of work in one context. Someone should critically evaluate all of the systems and eliminate some. There must be a change.
We must ensure the initiative goes back to the kinds of organisations Professor Norris has described where there is collaboration between local authorities. Both Patricia King and I were involved with the National Roads Authority at one time or another. When it was established, the National Roads Authority got all the motorways under way. It had very large projects for big motorways but it also put in regional design offices. What Ms King and Professor Norris are talking about is very much the same idea - regional design offices where you get the amalgamated capacity of a couple of local authorities together with architects and planners to bring the whole system through.
On the planning I remember and the planning that is there now, the planning that is there now is completely dominated by legalities. It is called the Planning and Development Act. Everybody knows about the planning. The planning is all about control. It should not be about control. Real planners do not just control; they envisage. They look into the future and see what is possible. They do what is necessary for their own local authorities in their own areas, which they know very well. The initiative has been taken away from them and it must be given back. I believe that is how Eddie Taaffe described it when he was here on behalf of the CCMA. That should be taken seriously. The local authorities should be empowered and allowed to go back to what they do best, which is responding to local needs.
On the points made regarding maintenance, the fact is that local authorities cannot afford to maintain a lot of their own housing. It relies on refurbishment schemes that may come 15 years after the houses were built when they should have been maintained the whole time. That is a gross waste of money because maintaining something you have left for 15 years costs a multiple of what it costs to maintain it every two years, as you would do with your own house.
The system is wrong. The overall commission view is that we should move to affordable rental. This is a different model that Professor Norris has described whereby there is enough capacity, enough turnaround and a circular economy. Ms Edwards has also mentioned this. It is the dominant feature of European housing.
Mr. Michael O'Flynn:
Some of the Deputy's questions were also directed at me. There will not be changes to planning and delivery without change. I am sorry but the process at the moment is extremely complicated, as David O'Connor has just described. It has become very legalistic. If you are trying to achieve the dramatic emergency measures necessary, you are not going to do it by keeping everything as we have it at this moment in time. We have to accept that the processes are holding us back and that we need emergency measures. That might be new legislation, temporary legislation or directives. I do not know. That is the members' area, not mine. In speaking about banks, we cannot expect-----
Micheál Carrigy (Longford-Westmeath, Fine Gael)
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I might come back to Mr. O'Flynn. I just want the next speaker in. I am sorry but we have gone way over time. I am conscious that I must give everyone an opportunity.
Maria McCormack (Sinn Fein)
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I am sorry; I missed a piece in the middle. Like Deputy Butterly, a lot of my questions have already been answered. Again like Deputy Butterly, I live in a small county, Laois, but our population is growing very significantly. Since the last census, we have grown by 8.5%. Being a commuter town causes serious problems. We have had a very significant influx of people coming into the town and we just do not have the level of building needed. It comes down to small builders not being able to get finance. Commencements in Laois are just at a standstill. What is in the commission report that is going to help get building going again and to get it to a more affordable level? As a county, Laois has the second lowest level of disposable income in the country. We need to look at this and to see how we can make sure that areas outside of the big cities are included in this. We must have plans for these areas because we need to get back to affordability. Right now, there is just no affordable housing in Laois.
Mr. John O'Connor:
I thank the Senator. We absolutely need more focus on towns like Portlaoise and the rest of Laois. To go back to infrastructure, we talked about water supply. The water supply we need for the greater Dublin area is even more needed in Laois. It is severely affected by that issue.
We need the kinds of plans that support towns and villages. The biggest issue is not having investment in the infrastructure in those towns and villages. If investment is made in water and wastewater infrastructure, it greatly facilitates the development and provision of housing. Yes, we do need a lot more to be done in towns and villages.
Mr. Michael O'Flynn:
To answer the Senator's question about banks, they cannot fund something unless it is viable. I agree with her on affordability but we have a massive viability issue, particularly in the villages, which are more impacted than metropolitan areas. It is okay to say that it is not affordable or viable. If it is not affordable, it is because viability is an issue. We cannot expect banks to lend for something that is not viable. This is not just a single issue; this is range of issues.
Maria McCormack (Sinn Fein)
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I understand that but if we are looking at viability, there is land available to be zoned but we do not have developers who are willing to build in these areas. We have a growing population so the demand and need for housing are there but we just do not have the houses to meet it. It is not that we do not have valid areas for this; we have them but we just need investment in the area.
Mr. Michael O'Flynn:
I can assure the Senator that if it was viable, the market would supply and invest. We need to look at why particular projects are not viable and the land costs so much and address questions such as the amount of zoned land and land that has infrastructure in place. That is why people are not developing in those areas. They would if it made sense. I am not talking here just about profit, in case I get spoken to again. We have to make a profit to get funding and we have to get funding to develop. Honestly, if a project was viable, developers in those areas would be building.
Dr. Ronan Lyons:
It might help to clarify two related but unfortunately competing issues here. One is affordability, which is housing prices compared with incomes. As was said, including in the report, housing prices are high relative to incomes. At the same time, there is a viability challenge, which is housing prices relative to costs. Mr. Flynn is saying that housing prices are low relative to costs and that it costs too much for the market to come in and build. This concerns policymakers and touches on some of the questions that came up earlier as well. Policymakers really need to focus on the cost-to-income relationship, whether it be for social or market housing. They need to skip the housing prices bit and consider how much it costs to build a home. To give the example of Laois, how far up the income distribution would it have to be to make it viable for the market to come in and provide? I suspect if policymakers did that exercise for Laois, they would probably end up in the top third or certainly the top half of the income distribution, which is a crazy situation if we take a step back. It says that only for those in the top third of the income distribution is it viable to provide new housing. However, if we think of it in those terms and consider Professor Norris's point about the provision of affordable social and cost-rental housing and the provision of market housing, it becomes a lot clearer that those two groups need to cover 100% of the income distribution. Otherwise people are being missed in the middle. That missing or forgotten middle is the challenge and how we have ended up where we are today, ten or 12 years into a housing shortage.
Maria McCormack (Sinn Fein)
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That is definitely the case, and we have the missing middle because of the housing crisis. Being a commuter town, Portlaoise did not always have this problem but now there is such demand, we are not getting the houses built to keep up with it.
Joe Cooney (Clare, Fine Gael)
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I would like to come back in on a point made regarding the issue I raised. Mr. O'Connor made a good point that funding should be put in place for people to carry out a survey on the costing of doing up old derelict and vacant houses. I fully agree. In fairness to Mr. O'Flynn, he also mentioned looking at the grant. There is a big difference between doing up a four-bedroom, two-storey house in the country and doing up a two-bedroom bungalow. It would be a good thing if the grants could be looked at and also if a survey could be carried out to see exactly what it is costing. The grants could then be varied in a way that might get more people interested in getting these houses back into use. Maybe Mr. O'Flynn could comment on that. There are a lot of houses in towns and villages lying vacant, unfortunately.
Professor Michelle Norris:
I want to make one related point. Generally, the grants are only available for houses or dwellings that have been occupied previously. It is the same with the SEAI upgrading grants. The house has to have been occupied or partially occupied as a dwelling, like a pub, for instance. There are a lot of derelict properties in rural Ireland, including former schools and former Garda stations, that were never occupied as a house but would be suitable for conversion. These are currently outside the scope of the supports.
Mr. David O'Connor:
In my time in Mayo County Council my colleagues and I looked at one of the rural towns. We were able to demonstrate that the centre of the town had become completely empty. Businesses were not viable because people were shopping in the bigger towns. There are huge opportunities for that to be dealt with if we can make the grants associated with the size of the capacity for the resolution. There is a social benefit to some and that should be brought into the assessment to give a higher grant level.
Mr. Michael O'Flynn:
My answer is the same. There needs to be a sea-change in our approach. The Deputy's question is a really good one. We need to tear and rip the suit, change what is there and make it attractive for people to refurbish and live in these places. We will not do so without change. We cannot change the world without making changes.
Paula Butterly (Louth, Fine Gael)
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I want to go back to the point about the viability of apartment buildings. If travelling to London or New York, we can see how they demolish a skyscraper in seconds and if we go back within a couple of months, a new one will be up. It is astonishing. I am confused by this density issue because Dublin is as flat as a pancake. It should be four times the height that it is in certain areas. It is only in Ireland that we call them high-rise. Everywhere else, there are skyscrapers and architectural structures that are absolutely fabulous. Is it only in relation to social apartments or is it also in the private sector that we cannot make it viable? This is where I am confused because my understanding is that the smaller the plot of land, the higher one needs to go and if a higher density can be got into a smaller area, then it would be cheaper to build. I am obviously wrong on this but if that could be explained to me, I would appreciate it. That is a huge issue. More than 50% of our family structures are one-, two- or three-person houses and this figure is going to increase. Apartment living seems to be the more viable option, going forward.
Mr. Michael O'Flynn:
We have very high standards, and so we should. To answer the Deputy's question, it is quite the opposite to what she described. The higher you go, the more difficult it is to make it viable. We built one of the tallest buildings in Ireland back in the day, the Elysian in Cork. The top storeys of that building were completely neutral as regards return on investment. It is not what the Deputy think. "Compact entities" are the new buzzwords. High-density buildings or skyscrapers, as the Deputy calls them, are not that efficient in terms of value and return, so they will not happen at this time. If we were to do a residual value, which is what a site would be worth with a high-density apartment block on it, it would have a minus value. That minus value is not going to change anytime soon. This is an enormous challenge that cannot be answered in a quick question here, under time pressure.
Dr. Ronan Lyons:
The Deputy's comment on household size is absolutely right. There is a statistic in the report that indicates between two thirds and three quarters of additional households will be one- and two-person and not even three-person households. Notwithstanding Mr. O'Flynn's point, which is valid, there are instances of projects which have proposed to go higher.
Usually, they are non-residential, but some are residential. We have an aversion to allowing tall buildings because if it is a mistake, it is a more prominent mistake. In many cases, people will not want to build 20 or more storeys, but developments of eight to 12 storeys would be viable in large parts of Dublin. Unfortunately, that is not allowed.
Mr. David O'Connor:
Historically, we have had some very dense development of houses. I draw the attention of the committee to places like Stoneybatter and parts of Ballsbridge directly opposite the RDS, which are not far from here. They have densities in the area of 70 units per hectare. They are small houses, but they are perfectly viable. It is still possible to build those kinds of house if we do not take them over with car parking spaces, for example. There is more than one way of skinning this cat. We need to get that out there.
Séamus McGrath (Cork South-Central, Fianna Fail)
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I want to pick up on the issue of viability again, which I raised previously. I heard Mr. O'Flynn refer to subsidies for apartment blocks and so on. That is needed because of where we are now. In the long term, though, if we cannot make development viable, then we are doomed to failure. That is the bottom line and the nub of the issue. If it is not viable to build, we are in trouble. We can subsidise in the short to medium term, but that cannot continue forever.
We are caught for time. How do we address the issue of viability? It does not relate solely to apartment blocks. Many builders will say it is not viable to build housing developments unless they have the land at a particular price, infrastructure costs are low and so on. I will go back to Mr. O'Flynn because he spoke about viability and said we did not have time. I will allow him some time to speak. What are the key measures we can take on viability? That is the nub of the issue with the housing crisis. If it is not viable to build, we are in trouble.
Mr. Michael O'Flynn:
That is a fair comment. I am tired of people not understanding the costs involved in our business model. The reality of the situation is that we need an open book approach to all of our costs. If a lot of people at this committee meeting understood the cost of our business model, they might understand the difficulties we have because people somehow think higher prices means higher profits. Higher prices do not mean higher profits.
We are trying to do the impossible when it comes to one of the most highly regulated apartment design regimes in the world. I am not suggesting we change anything, but the reality is that we need to consider the land and infrastructure costs, VAT and all of the rest. If we were serious about catching up with the shortfall and addressing the rental crisis, VAT would have been removed from apartments a number of years ago. Many issues could be dealt with.
Waivers have been introduced to help with housing. We need special waivers for apartments and special financing, be it from Europe or elsewhere, to help with funding the cost of development. Everything we do goes to the end purchaser, be it a private individual, housing body or whoever else. We should have an open book situation, something I have promoted for the industry for a long time.
I ask people to stop saying that, if the State did this, it would do it more cheaply. If we were prepared to put all of our costs on the table, the Deputy would be surprised by how little of a margin there is at this time in any of those types of development. Many apartment developments in this country are happening because of the involvement of AHBs, the LDA and others. Without them, there would be no apartment developments.
I will not get into rent pressure zones or the challenges with rent at this hour of the evening. The reality of the situation is that unless a development is viable, it is not fundable, and if it is not fundable, it will not happen. We need to accept the real costs, interrogate and certify them and introduce whatever system is desired. If we all got onto the same page on costs, perhaps we could do something about that because there is a myth that builders make a lot of profit. That is not the case. If it was, development would be happening. Let us move forward and learn from the past because we are failing people in all sectors of the housing community.
Mr. John O'Connor:
I have a last point on viability, although it needs a lot more time to go through. Certainty is a huge element. I will not go into detail on the pyrite remediation scheme, but construction inflation in that scheme is running at a third of construction inflation generally and it is because of certainty. When there is certainty, we can cut down on inflation.
Micheál Carrigy (Longford-Westmeath, Fine Gael)
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I will ask my question and then bring a couple of members back in. We will then finish and go into private session. A couple of members have indicated, so they will have an opportunity.
My question is simple and the witnesses can answer individually. There are 83 recommendations in the report. We are where we are. The witnesses heard the announcement today. What would each witness put as the number one recommendation that needed to be implemented straight away in order to make a difference in housing?
Dr. Ronan Lyons:
My fellow commissioners could probably predict my reply. If we get the requirement right, then the rest has to follow. For too long, we have worked in a system that has refused to recognise the substantial housing need that exists. Recognising that, understanding there is a deficit of perhaps 300,000 homes at the moment and that we need perhaps 1.5 million homes over the next generation, putting that in writing and figuring out how we get from here to there in 25 years is the starting point.
Professor Michelle Norris:
On rental housing, one of the biggest reforms that would enable the move towards 20% social and cost-rental housing would be the establishment of local authority housing organisations. Local authorities need to be supported in getting back into housing delivery at a larger scale.
Mr. John O'Connor:
I would agree with what Ms King said on increasing the amount of social and cost-rental housing. It is about collaboration between the public and private sectors. Even within the public sector, we all need to work on the same aim. We should not be looking at our own organisations but at delivering housing. That is nearly the most important element. There are too many silos. Everybody is in a silo, and we have to remove that.
Mr. Michael O'Flynn:
In the same vein, the requirement to which Dr. Lyons referred feeds into zoning changes. These zoning changes are critical and have to happen immediately, otherwise we will not make any change.
That leads on to infrastructure. I am encouraged by the new structure being established by the Minister, Deputy Chambers, because it looks like it will tackle the current infrastructure deficiencies. The requirement, zoning and infrastructure are important. I agree with Mr. David O'Connor that all of that comes under the oversight executive. If the Chair wants one answer, I would argue that we need an oversight executive with legislative powers to be put in place and get on with what needs to be done.
Micheál Carrigy (Longford-Westmeath, Fine Gael)
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I thank the witnesses. Senator McCarthy indicated that he wished to contribute again. Deputy Hearne asked a question that I did not allow be answered, as we had gone over time. We might take that question again.
Aubrey McCarthy (Independent)
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The recommendations in this are a game-changer, and the witnesses have done great work. How did it come about that the former Housing Commission was disbanded? Why are the witnesses only now coming to the housing committee? Why are we dealing with this only now?
Mr. John O'Connor:
The Senator would have to ask the Minister that. We had finished our task. Our task was to produce a report and make recommendations. It would have been beneficial and would still be beneficial to have more engagement with the Housing Commission to understand the recommendations made.
Professor Michelle Norris:
We received a letter from the Minister disbanding us. I sat on several of these commissions but never received a similar letter, namely a letter disbanding me.
We have had very limited engagement with the Department of housing. I acknowledge that I have had some on social housing, but it has been very limited. We were told the Housing Agency was being commissioned to do a full costing of the implementation of the commission’s report but we have never seen that or been engaged on that in any way. If colleagues from the Department of housing appear before the committee, it would be very nice, from my perspective, if members asked them where the report is.
Rory Hearne (Dublin North-West, Social Democrats)
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Why is that? What has been set out is obviously significant and comprehensible and calls for a radical reset, but what are the officials afraid of?
Ms Patricia King:
I do not know, but within days of the publication the Department said two things, namely that the implementation of two thirds of the recommendations was already done and that the implementation of one third was in train. We were disbanded and that was the end of our association with it.
Rory Hearne (Dublin North-West, Social Democrats)
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Is Professor Norris referring to what is implied by the ticked boxes?
Mr. Michael O'Flynn:
The questions are valid. It is extremely concerning for those of us who put a lot of time and effort into this. It is extraordinary that we were disbanded like we were. This has been described well by colleagues from the commission. It is extraordinary to set up something like this and disband it without launching, debating or interrogating the report asking whether it represents the answer. Why did we set it up if we were not going to assess its findings and decide whether they would be the answer? It is quite extraordinary. To be fair to the Senator and the Deputy, these are very fair questions. For the sake of future commissions and structures like this, I would certainly like to know a lot more than I know at the moment, given the effort put in by many of us on the work.
Rory Hearne (Dublin North-West, Social Democrats)
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The obvious thing is to ask the commission members whether they would be willing to continue if asked again to continue monitoring and implementing. While I disagree with some of the witnesses, I believe they have provided something excellent. The amount of time and work they put in is incredible and there is so much in it that the obvious thing is to bring the commission back again.
Micheál Carrigy (Longford-Westmeath, Fine Gael)
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I found its work extremely insightful and informative. The cutting-edge response is what we need. I said on my first day as Chair, and as a member of a Government party, that there is an emergency. We have to treat it as such and, if we do not, we will not make changes.
Micheál Carrigy (Longford-Westmeath, Fine Gael)
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I would be very open to further discussion. It is important. I want to hear every opinion. Everyone is not going to agree on everything, but we need to listen to everyone’s views and inform what we regard as the best way to address what is an emergency. That is the only way we are going to deal with it. I am conscious of Deputy Hearne’s question that was not answered. We have one minute. Does he want to leave it? We have taken up a couple of minutes.
Rory Hearne (Dublin North-West, Social Democrats)
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Mr. O'Flynn and I have different points of view on what a public construction company could do and I do not think he needs to fear it as much as he thinks he needs to. Do the witnesses want to refer to the question about interest in the market, the question of the minority report?
Dr. Ronan Lyons:
I feel quite strongly about this. I know I am not asking the Deputy questions and that he is asking me questions, which is fine, but I encourage him to read the minority report. If he can find anything in it that is in any way connected to the idea that there are vested interests who want to keep housing prices high, he will find it is literally untrue. As I know from having been involved in how it came about and in writing and submitting it, I can state it was done from legal and social perspectives. One can read the legal bit. The social perspective concerned the question of how best we align the laws and the Constitution with the goals of the wider commission report. We had a disagreement with the majority in the commission, which is fine, but in no way was there a question of how we could limit housing production to keep rents and prices high. Rather, it was a question of how best to achieve systemic change, through constitutional change if necessary, to bring about a healthy housing system. I encourage members to read the minority report. I will be happy to talk one to one with the Deputy about how the report came to be and where our heads were at in terms of the recommendation. I am willing to take criticism or comments on the recommendation we made but it is not fair in any way to connect the minority report with vested interests in some sort of vague sense.
Mr. Michael O'Flynn:
I was a co-author of that report with Dr. Lyons. He described it well. I assure the Deputy that there was no vested interest at play here. It was a case of doing what we felt was crucial for Irish society and was in no way trying to keep homes away from anyone. We had very strong views and engaged some really good people, and I stand over the report fully, like Dr. Lyons does. I am really pleased the referendum did not proceed at the time. Many issues are being mentioned towards the end that are really important, but it is extraordinary to think we are where we are in light of the effort that was made and the fact that we have not made more progress. It is over two years since interim measures were put to the Minister as regards what would help the crisis. It is over a year since the report came out and now we are talking about almost resurfacing as a group. I do not believe that is practical, to be blunt about it, but the report exists and it stands. It is detailed and well researched and it has plenty in it. If people are interested in discussing aspects of it, they may by all means do so, but it would certainly make an enormous difference to housing needs in Irish society.
Micheál Carrigy (Longford-Westmeath, Fine Gael)
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I thank Mr. O'Flynn. We will leave the last comment to the former chair.
Mr. John O'Connor:
For clarity, the main report of the commission is the report. It was essentially agreed by all commission members. It is not to be confused. Separately, we were asked to propose wording for a referendum on housing. That entails a separate report that may need a separate discussion. I advise members to read the referendum report of the commission, the appendices and the minority report. For clarity, the main report is the report. To remove any confusion, there is no minority report on the main report.
Micheál Carrigy (Longford-Westmeath, Fine Gael)
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I thank Mr. O'Connor. I think we have-----
Mr. Michael O'Flynn:
I have to contradict what has just been said. There was a majority report, and a number of us did not agree with it. There is no question. Why would you call a report a minority report if there was only one report? I will not get into the detail now. I take great exception to many of the issues around that report and I object to what has been said by the former chairperson.
Micheál Carrigy (Longford-Westmeath, Fine Gael)
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We will finish up on that.
I thank all the representatives from the former commission. First, I thank them for the time they gave to the commission’s report, considering the amount of personal time they put into it. I found the report extremely insightful. It is disappointing that, after putting time into a report, they were dealt with in the manner they were dealt with, receiving a letter afterwards. That is not acceptable from any Department, to be quite honest. These are people who gave their time voluntarily. It is unacceptable. I thank them for taking the time to come in today, both those online and in person. I found this meeting informative, as I believe all members did. It is important. When we were discussing who the committee wished to speak to in order to inform us, as a lot of us are new members to this housing committee, the Housing Commission was at the top of the list. I thank the witnesses for giving their insights into how they see we can deal with what is an emergency. I thank them all. That concludes the committee's business in public session. I now propose the committee goes into private session to consider other business.