Paul Kehoe (Wexford, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I thank the Minister for bringing forward this important Bill. It is a major step in addressing a current problem, a fact accepted by people on all sides of the House. This Fine Gael-led Government, including the Labour Party, was elected a little over four years ago to fix a broken economy and country. Today is another step forward in fixing what has been a major problem for us as a Government and as a country in recent years.

The Government's Construction 2020 strategy, published in May 2014, was one of the steps taken to help the economy to recover. It contains a comprehensive range of actions designed to increase activity in the construction sector as well as help to economic recovery, job creation and the re-birth of the construction sector in a more sustainable way.

The Bill will address housing supply issues by helping to increase housing construction activity, particularly in the Dublin area, where it is a major problem. In my constituency of Wexford it is a major problem as well. Wexford is like any other county in the country where there is a major housing shortage.

As a result of the economic collapse under the previous Government the number of housing units constructed in Ireland fell by a mere 8,300 nationally in 2013, with only 1,360 of these in Dublin, while the number of house completions increased to 11,000 units in 2014, including almost 3,000 in Dublin. More needs to be done in this area and I believe the Minister, Deputy Kelly, and the Minister of State, Deputy Coffey, recognise this.

It is estimated that in years to come we will need to build approximately 25,000 units nationally each year to meet the projected housing demand, with more than 8,000 of these units in Dublin. This tells us the extent of the problem we are facing. The Bill provides for a range of measures which will help to address the issues, including the amendment of the Part V provisions of the Planning and Development Acts to support the provision of social housing, the introduction of the revised arrangements relating to the application of development contributions by planning authorities and the introduction of a new measure, a vacant site levy, to incentivise the development of vacant and unutilised sites in urban areas for housing and regeneration purposes.

We have a major problem in towns throughout Ireland. A major Irish retail business, Dunnes Stores, opened up several new stores a number of years ago on the edges of towns and left our urban centres. This has left stores in the centre of our urban areas closed, vacant and empty. This is causing major blight in towns and cities throughout Ireland. Dunnes Stores has an onus to act because the people in each of the towns where it has premises have been supporting Dunnes Stores for many years. It is about time Dunnes Stores went about renting out these vacant properties in urban areas. Specifically I have in mind Main Street in my town of Enniscorthy where there is a huge vacant store. It is a blight on that street. This absolutely infuriates the rest of the retailers and traders in and around the town.

Towns have been under major pressure in the past few years and doing their best to keep their shops open. If we are to reinvigorate town centres, people should rent out their vacant stores because plenty of others are interested in them. They should not be afraid of competition in the area.

The Bill will introduce a vacant site levy to incentivise the development of vacant sites in urban areas. This will help the supply of housing and incentivise regeneration in areas where this is much needed. In the past few years the presence of vacant sites in towns has caused a huge problem. The Bill further provides for reduced development contribution charges, a measure which has been adopted by local authorities since 2013 and which can have retrospective effect for planning permissions granted prior to that date, with the provision that the cost saving can be passed on to developments for which planning permission was granted prior to that date.

There is a lot more to say about the Bill, but we are under time pressure. I very much welcome the Bill and hope it will solve the huge housing crisis. Every family should have the opportunity to own a house, but there are many people who are unable to buy and invest in a house. As a Government, we have to give them an opportunity to own their own house. The Bill will help these families.

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