Patrick O'Donovan (Limerick County, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I am happy to step in for the Minister, Deputy Darragh O’Brien, to discuss the Labour Party motion on housing targets and regulation. The Government is not opposing the motion. Work is already under way under the Government’s Housing for All plan on a number of proposals set out in the motion. I welcome the opportunity to update the House on the progress made to date and the ongoing work that will address some of the issues.

To start, the motion proposes that the housing targets set out in Housing for All are too low. The plan currently sets out an annual target of overall housing delivery to 2030, which clearly show a building up of targets towards 40,000 homes per year. It is important to note that Housing for All targets are based on independent peer-reviewed research by the ESRI and any suggested alternative targets are not underpinned by such a robust evidence base and should be viewed accordingly. It was, however, always intended that these targets would be kept under review and this work has already started. The targets are currently under review and updated targets will be published later on in the year.

Looking back, 2019 was the last full year of housing delivery before the pandemic, and Housing for All was yet to be published. That year, just over 21,000 new homes were delivered following the delivery of almost 18,000 in the pervious year of 2018. Naturally, after the fall-off in completion seen in the preceding years, we knew the industry would take time to recover and expand to the levels required to deliver the homes we need. Although things were picking up speed, Covid-19 also impacted the sector and construction completely stopped for several months. The entire industry and housing ecosystem was disrupted on and off for almost two years.

The year 2022 represented the first full year of delivery since 2019. As much as we would like to have jumped straight in to building 40,000 houses per year, this was just not possible. Targets needed to be set in a way that would afford the sector the time it would need to recover and the capacity to delivery the ambition set out in Housing for All, and this was done. Increasing targets were set to build up delivery towards 2030. Of course, the overall targets themselves are based on published independent research by the ESRI and, as already stated, are the only ones that are supported by peer review and an evidence base. Any revision to the target set out in Housing for All will be subject to the same stringent reviews. Despite that acknowledgement, the recovery will take time.

A resilient industry, coupled with many measures the Government has taken and continues to take through Housing for All, delivered almost 30,000 houses in 2022 and nearly 33,000 houses last year. This surpassed our targets by 5,000 and by almost 4,000, respectively. We believe the delivery of this level of extra housing should be a cause for celebration rather than condemnation. While we are not stopping, positive trends are indicating that we will meet or exceed overall targets again this year. The pipeline is strong, with 32,800 new homes commencing construction in 2023 and permission granted for more than 37,600.

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