Ciarán Lynch (Cork South Central, Labour)

As I have stated in the House previously, there is no long term security of tenure for a social housing applicant in this programme and neither is there an exit policy. The Minister of State is on record in this regard in reply to a parliamentary question. Even though he is shepherding local authorities into this approach by saying it is the only show in town, he is not giving them any direction as to how they will get out of the difficulty he is creating for them in ten to 20 years' time when these leases expire.

My final supplementary remark is that the Minister of State is being somewhat disingenuous when he states he has met the target of 2,000 last year as approximately three quarters of those were affordable homes and social housing. What he has done is to convert social housing and affordable programmes into a leasing programme and he did not meet his target in the private sector, which was 2,000.

Is the option to purchase only available on those social and affordable homes or is there an option to purchase on the private properties being leased? The sum of money which is an income for the local authority is based on the rent differential where a tenant pays a rent equivalent to a standard social housing house would run to several hundred euro a month. Will the Minister of State confirm that this money is ring-fenced specifically for the maintenance of these properties leased from developers and cannot be spent by the local authority other than to reinstate these properties at the end of the lease?

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