Dáil debates

Tuesday, 4 October 2022

Housing for All Update: Statements

 

6:50 pm

Photo of Michael MoynihanMichael Moynihan (Cork North West, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I welcome the opportunity to speak on this matter. It is the fundamental issue of our time. Housing is greatly important. I wish to hone in on a few things that can be changed. Rural Ireland has great capacity to build and expand housing. A great deal of work has been done in urban places for generations at this stage and it is now high time we examined building houses in rural Ireland. I welcome the Croí Cónaithe scheme and its extension to ensure it is available in rural communities. Equally, we must have an appraisal of the existing planning regulations, even those concerning one-off housing. I refer to the hoops people are being put through when trying to get planning permission for a modest house in a rural community. We have also seen issues arising with An Bord Pleanála. We must face these and look into the issues that have existed, and perhaps also at some of the decisions made previously.

The opening contribution of the Minister, Deputy Darragh O'Brien, contained several points. He said that if housing was good enough to rent, then it was good enough to buy. We must explore the situation regarding houses in rural communities, where people may be on an invalidity pension or might have money because of having had an accident. People in those situations should be allowed to purchase their houses. I am talking in particular about rural houses built by the county councils throughout the years. These are houses built predominantly on sites provided by the tenants now resident in them. I welcome the important decision in this regard that was made in February to extend an initiative in respect of pensioners, but it is also time we considered the invalidity pension and other State benefits and ensured that people who are in a position to purchase their houses can do so. I say this because this is a win-win situation. It would ensure that equity is returned to the county councils and that money is generated from it. I ask the Minister of State to explore this aspect and to convey this point to the Minister, Deputy Darragh O'Brien. It is crucially important.

Turning to the issue of State-owned land, and Deputy O'Donnell will be familiar with where I am going to talk about, Cork County Council owns land in Charleville that should be earmarked for housing. It is zoned for housing and it has the requisite services. The county council, the other local authorities and Irish Water installed services again recently when work was done on the streetscape. This land should be made available for housing. Too many hoops must be gone through in this regard. We go out and try to get private land, and all the rest of it, but a vast amount of land is already available in this regard. It should be available for housing. My colleague, Councillor Ian Doyle, has been working at council level on this matter. This aspect of the housing issue should be recognised and it should be examined.

Additionally, we announced some of the small village schemes last year for sewerage works to be done, including for Castlemagner in my constituency. That scheme was announced in late September 2021. The wastewater treatment plant there has great potential for upgrading. It is centrally positioned. When schemes like these are announced, they should be approached with seriousness and intent by the local authorities, the Department and Irish Water to ensure they are completed in a timely fashion and that the work does not drag on and go through hoop after hoop. It must be ensured that it takes the shortest possible time to release land that is available and can be built on. Addressing these issues, which occur across the country, in urban and, in particular, in rural areas, can help to answer the questions now being asked about the provision of housing.

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