Darragh O'Brien (Dublin Fingal, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I know the Deputy is earnest about this issue and that he raises it regularly. For the Deputy’s information, the price ceiling for the first home scheme in Dublin is €475,000 for a home and €500,000 for an apartment, and we review those ceilings every six months. On that scheme, we have had more than 7,000 registrations and more than 3,000 approvals, many of which were in the Deputy's county. There remain major challenges in affordability. I thank the SCSI for the work it has done and the report it has brought forward and that report speaks to the challenges we have. That is why we need to continue to advance Housing for All. What is important is that we increase supply across the board.

On social housing, I am a firm believer that the State needs to lead by example and we made a step change in delivery in that we will deliver more new social homes this year across the country, in all 31 local authority areas. There will be significant social housing delivery this year, more than we did last year. We will deliver substantially more affordable housing than we did last year. That will be significant and a good footprint. We will also deliver through the Land Development Agency, which the Deputy knows well from his area. Let us look at Shanganagh Castle which has good cost rental, affordable and social homes. We will be recapitalising and further capitalising the Land Development Agency to deliver more homes and that is what we are doing.

You cannot turn this around in two years. We have made it possible to have a footprint and pipeline of significant homes across this country, both at a social and an affordable level, in providing the supports for many of those renters and working families to be able to buy the homes through the first home scheme and the help-to-buy grant. Some 42,500 households have accessed the help-to-buy grant so far and there have been more than 7,000 registrations for the first home scheme. Across the board we need to deliver more homes and we are doing that. The figures for planning permissions were released just today. For the month of October they were 45% up on this time last year, with more than 9,000 homes approved.

I have brought in legislation, as the Deputy knows, which he supported, namely, the owner-occupier guarantee. That was the ban on the bulk purchases of homes by investor funds. We did that and that has taken shape. Thousands of planning permissions have been granted, with an owner-occupier guarantee, which means the home is for a family or an individual. We have changed the local authority affordable home loan. We have upped the income limits for singles in particular because it can be difficult for singles to purchase properties. That is why the first home scheme does not discriminate against them in any way, shape or form and it is why the Croí Cónaithe vacancy grant does not do so either. It is also why we have changed the local authority affordable home loan and upped the income limits there. We are making progress and there is more to do in that space. We have cost rental tenancies in place for the first time ever in Ireland. I will come back in on my supplementary contribution.

See this speech in context