Seán Canney (Galway East, Independent) | Oireachtas source

I welcome this opportunity to discuss what is the most pressing issue for many families and young people. I heard many people talking tonight about what is wrong, what the problems are and what people are suffering. I come across these aspects in my constituency. Many people might think this is a city-based problem. In fact, it is experienced right across rural Ireland as well. Young people are not getting a chance to build their own houses or to get mortgages to buy houses. They are stuck in this bind. At the other end of this situation, people come into my office who have applied for social housing and have found that the thresholds are so low that they cannot get onto the ladder.

Taking Galway County Council as an example, the income threshold is lower in the county than in the city. People therefore try to get onto the city's local authority housing waiting list, but they must prove that they have a link to the area and all this kind of thing. Those people are going around doing paperwork without getting any place with it. It is very stressful. A woman contacted me today who has until 28 July before she must vacate her house because it is being sold. She has two children who are aged one and four. She is a single mother. She is in a bind and her only recourse is to go to the homeless services and God knows where she will end up from there.

When we come back to why involuntary landlords are selling houses or whatever, there is a problem in this regard. People may own a house they wish to sell. It might be their second house or they might have ended up with a house by default, perhaps by inheriting it or whatever. They may have been renting that house and now want to sell it for family reasons, etc. These things will happen. We need to find solutions to these kinds of problems. The basic problem is supply. The Northern and Western Regional Assembly undertook a survey where it was found that there were 44,500 vacant properties in its area. Those almost 45,000 vacant properties are there to be taken in and made use of for people to live in. Most of these vacant properties are in our towns and villages where the communities could do with additional people living in them.

I understand that the Minister may be bringing forward some sort of a grant scheme worth €30,000 per house for first-time buyers of second-hand properties or vacant properties. We in the Regional Group called for this measure in the last budget. We were led to believe that it would happen. It is beginning to happen now, almost a year later. One of the frustrations concerning housing is that decisions are slow to come and when they do come, another year has passed and the situation has worsened.

The biggest problem with new builds from the perspective of the local authorities is that we have a huge issue with trying to get projects to the stage where they can go to construction. I have no doubt but that the construction industry can build all the houses we need. We can use innovative techniques. We talk about modular homes and the use of precast and timber-framed elements. That is the easy part of it. It takes up to six years to get a project from inception to the stage where a building contractor is appointed to undertake the work. The building stage is the easiest. Until we face up to the fact that housing is an imperative issue of overriding public interest, take the planning process and bring in a fast-tracked approach to building social housing, we will still be talking about the housing supply issue in five years’ time.

We need to look at the planning and procurement processes that are in place for public works. We need to look at the public spending code and set these things aside, because a plethora of appraisals and approvals are required throughout a process, which can hold up projects for months on end. I am bringing forward solutions. This is not a criticism. We need to act on this quickly if we are to increase the number of social houses being built. Above all, we must make sure that local authorities are properly resourced so that they can manage their housing stocks, turn around the vacant properties as fast as they can, and build houses quickly.

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