Mairead Farrell (Galway West, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

Gabhaim buíochas leis an Aire. He will find that, on Galway City Council, it is actually Fianna Fáil councillors who voted against certain public housing being built. I am glad that he wants to hear constructive solutions. I will get straight into them.

A report released on Monday by the Society of Chartered Surveyors Ireland stated that the construction cost of two-bedroom apartments in urban areas of Dublin now stands at between €219,000 and €262,000. Despite this, the council's own figures for social housing apartment projects, which are built on council-owned land, show prices averaging between €304,000 and €373,000, which is almost €100,000 more on average. In that report, the society calculates that the professional fees attached to the building of a two-bedroom apartment to be between €18,000 and €21,000 yet Dublin City Council was charged between €44,000 and €54,000 for the professional fees attached to its projects. One does not need to be a chartered accountant to see that something is clearly amiss. People have pointed out that there seems to be collusion between competitors to keep prices high. We need a normal functioning market. The State should be allowed to play its rightful part as a competitor, driving down these prices.

Dublin City Council tells us:

All our construction projects go through a thorough public procurement process in line with European Union and national regulations. At the end of that process the most economically advantageous tender is selected to carry out the project.

This raises the question of for whom is it most economically advantageous. It is not just the cost that is a problem. The reality is that it takes at least 18 months from a council deciding to build public housing to actually being able to deliver it. The timeline for project completions is astonishingly long. Before it could build social homes at Cornamona Court in Ballyfermot, it took Dublin City Council four years to get final stage approval from the Department of Housing, Local Government and Heritage for those 61 homes. For the 30 social homes built at North King Street near Smithfield, it took the council just under four years to get final stage approval from the Department.

One of Fianna Fáil's supposed big achievements in the area of social housing was to increase the value of projects eligible for single-stage approval. This was increased from €2 million to €6 million. The increase in the number of houses this has brought about has been minimal and the increase in turnaround time has been negligible. It is quite clear that the procurement process in respect of the provision of social housing has failed.

There are ways to address this. The Minister has asked us to outline ways in which this and the delivery of social housing can be improved so here we are. We need a radical overhaul of the procurement process. We need to allow councils to develop long-term relationships with builders. We absolutely need increased competition in the marketplace. We need to look at establishing a publicly-owned construction company. We also need to go back to direct build. This is the kind of realism and honesty that we need in the housing system. We need to fundamentally change the procurement process to deliver social housing and to finally remove the shackles and red tape that is hindering the councils' ability to deliver.

I take issue with what the Minister said earlier about Sinn Féin not wanting houses to be built. In Galway City Council, we have consistently supported the building and delivery of housing at times when Fianna Fáil members of the council did not. I ask an tAire to remove the red tape and to outline directly how he is going to make it easier for councils to fast-track the building and provision of public housing.

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