Damien English (Meath West, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

It is a condition of receiving resources. The Deputy raised issues with regard to certain local authorities not having spent money allocated for voids programmes and so on previously. They are often combined. The BER certificates are required and we do gather the data. It is gathered locally and then made available to us. I do not know whether we take it in every week but it is available to us because we have to have the data showing the difference in BER rating achieved to pay out under these schemes. The Deputy argues that we need more money. We know that but, to be fair, it is a big step in the right direction to have upgraded more than half the housing stock. This programme has been ongoing since 2013. We are committed to it. We will put funding in place in the years ahead to ensure it is completed. It has to happen but it will not all happen in one year. It certainly will happen over the coming years because it is very important. We depend on local authorities to prioritise the houses that need earlier work and intervention. Some counties have done great work in this regard. In the Deputy's own county of Limerick, more than 1,000 houses have been retrofitted. Tipperary is probably leading the charge in that close to 4,000 properties have been retrofitted in the county. There is a lot of movement in some local authorities. That is what we are trying to do. Naturally, we want to be able to respond to their requests as quickly as we possibly can. It will mean additional resources. That is work to which we are also committed under the climate action plan.

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