Enda Kenny (Mayo, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

This Government has given money, facilities and incentives to local authorities to do their job. For instance, we are now making rental a more attractive proposition for investors. The Department of Finance has set up a working group on the tax and fiscal treatment of landlords, which includes officials from the Department of Housing, Planning, Community and Local Government. We are taking action to bring vacant properties back into use. The repair and lease scheme, under which local authorities will refurbish vacant properties and lease them from their owners, was rolled out in February. That is real. That will deliver 3,500 properties by 2021. It will cost €150 million. They are making money available through the Housing Finance Agency to higher education institutes. They can now borrow money to build student accommodation, which will free up those houses where students are currently located.

We support the build-to-rent development through pathfinder sites. In February, the Minister for Housing, Planning, Community and Local Government, Deputy Simon Coveney, launched major infrastructural works at the Cherrywood site in Dublin, costing €35 million. We have requested the local authorities in rent pressure zones to use publicly owned sites to kickstart supply. In that regard, Dublin City Council brought forward a land initiative covering the three sites, at O'Devany Gardens, Oscar Traynor Road and St. Michael's in Inchicore. They are seeking partners to deliver a mix of social, affordable and private housing. These are all real aspects of the progress being made in terms of housing.

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