Cormac Devlin (Dún Laoghaire, Fianna Fail)

I welcome these statements on the Government’s updated housing plan, which rightly sets a minimum target of 300,000 homes, including 72,000 social and 90,000 affordable homes. The plan is backed by €9 billion in housing capital for next year alone. It focuses on activating land, clearing blockages and expanding housing first and family homelessness measures. This is essential if we are serious about meeting needs rather than chasing yearly targets.

In my area of Dún Laoghaire–Rathdown, we can clearly see what works when the State, the county council, the LDA and approved housing bodies pull in the same direction. Shanganagh Castle in Shankill is the largest social and affordable housing scheme in the country, with 597 new homes, including hundreds of social, cost-rental and affordable purchase homes in one integrated community. That is how we should be doing public housing everywhere, at scale, where mixed tenure and long-term affordability is built in. Alongside that, Dún Laoghaire–Rathdown has sharply increased allocations from its own stock and AHB homes in recent years, and has used voids funding to bring long-time vacant units back into use.

Those are the quiet but important wins for families on waiting lists and for people exiting emergency accommodation. However, nobody in Dún Laoghaire believes the job is done. Rents are still some of the highest in the State, and we see the human reality of homelessness every week. This plan will be judged on whether it speeds up approvals, gets more Shanganagh-type schemes on the ground, turns vacant properties into homes and gives local authorities the staffing and flexibility to deliver. If we do that, then this plan will not just deliver units on a spreadsheet, it will build new communities in Dún Laoghaire and across the State.

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