Seán Fleming (Laois-Offaly, Fianna Fail)
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I am grateful for this opportunity to refer to the letters that were issued by the Department of the Environment, Community and Local Government to local authorities last Friday. They announced major, severe and draconian cuts to housing adaption grants and a number of other grants. Last year, the Department allocated approximately €55 million for this important area, yet these grants will now be cut on average by 38%.

I want the Minister to explain why Laois was singled out for one of the worst cuts in the whole country. Last year, we received an allocation of €867,000 from the Department, but this year it has been cut by 76% to €208,000. The council provides its own 20% matching funds.

These housing adaption grants are for people with disabilities to help install access ramps, stair-lifts, downstair toilet facilities and showers. The scheme for housing aid for older people is to help those in poor housing conditions to make the necessary repairs so they can stay in their own homes. The mobility aids housing grant scheme is to allow people to get urgent works carried out, including grab-rails, access ramps, level access showers and stair-lifts. All of these grants have been cut dramatically.

It is noteworthy that the letters went out last Friday to local authorities and there was no public announcement. The letters were issued within 48 hours of the Minister of State, Deputy Kathleen Lynch, announcing the axing of the mobility allowance and the motorised transport grants. Two days after that announcement, the Minister chose not to issue a public statement on her decision to cut these grants by 40% on average. She merely issued a letter to local authorities. As I understand it, the figures are not even available across the country. Each local authority has its own information. At the first opportunity, the Minister should consider a supplementary Estimate for Laois in view of the excessive cut to grants in that county.

Robert Troy (Longford-Westmeath, Fianna Fail)
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I want to add my voice to this matter. What does the Government have against older people and those with disabilities? Last summer, we witnessed people with profound disabilities camping outside Government Buildings to ensure that their personal assistants would be reinstated. Last week, we saw cuts to the motorised grant and the mobility grant.

Today, one hears of cuts to the allocations of various county councils in respect of the disabled persons grant, the housing adaptation grant, the mobility grant and the housing aid for the elderly grant. Westmeath County Council will experience a grant cut of more than 46% from €988,155 to €435,722 this year. Longford County Council is facing a cut of 42% and this is despite both county councils, whose members I compliment, in their wisdom putting by their allocation from limited resources to ensure they could get the maximum possible allocation from the Department to ensure that older people and people with disabilities would be allowed to live out the rest of their lives in independence and with a sense of dignity. These grants are used to install stairlifts, access ramps and level access showers. They are used to replace windows and doors and to rewire houses. This is not about putting people into the lap of luxury but is simply about ensuring that elderly people and people with a disability can live in dignity.

The Minister of State will be obliged to revisit this issue. It is a callous cut and while I do not doubt the Minister of State is a genuine person who wishes to ensure that value for money is achieved, she must revisit this issue because, with their limited resources, the councils have allocated enough money to enable work to be done. In a final point, apart from the good work being done for those who benefit therefrom, such works are a major boost to small contractors in the rural areas. I know of a number of such contractors-----

Olivia Mitchell (Dublin South, Fine Gael)
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I thank the Deputy but he has gone way over time.

Robert Troy (Longford-Westmeath, Fianna Fail)
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-----who have stated they would have gone out of business in recent years were it not for this grant.

Olivia Mitchell (Dublin South, Fine Gael)
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I call on the Minister of State, Deputy Jan O'Sullivan, to respond.

Jan O'Sullivan (Limerick City, Labour)
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I thank Deputies Robert Troy and Sean Fleming for raising this matter. As Minister of State with responsibility for housing, I am keenly aware of the challenges the Government faces in delivering housing supports to a range of vulnerable households and groups. The difficulties facing the State's finances and the necessity to reduce public expenditure to sustainable levels are having an impact on capital programmes all across the public service and my Department's housing programme is no exception. Members will be aware and Fianna Fáil Deputies in particular should be aware of the reason for such reduced allocations. However, the amount of capital funding available has decreased significantly in recent years along the lines highlighted in the medium-term Exchequer framework for infrastructure and capital investment from 2012 to 2016. Regrettably, these steps are necessary to bring stability to the public finances and, as a result, capital spending on housing programmes in 2013 will be lower than last year. I could spend time explaining the reason for this but certainly, the previous Government has a great deal more responsibility for it than has any action taken by the current Administration. Unfortunately, one is faced with a situation in which capital budgets right across the board have been cut.

That said, I am determined to make the best use of this limited budget and to target those who are most in need. To this end, the social housing supply initiatives are now nearly completely focused on meeting the housing needs of elderly people, people with a disability and the homeless. Approximately €120 million is being dedicated to this important programme in 2013. Reduced capital budgets inevitably give rise to difficult choices and decisions in allocating the available funding. In the case of new social housing supply, there are alternative supply routes through the leasing of properties to augment the smaller numbers coming from the traditional capital funded construction programmes. Last year, more than 6,000 additional social housing units were provided, taking all supply routes into account, and I am confident that a further 5,000 units will be provided this year. These difficult choices mean balancing a dwindling capital budget across a range of important areas and spreading those scarce resources in a way that meets the needs of those concerned as best one can. The capital budget must cover regeneration, improvements and energy retrofitting of the social housing stock, as well as adaptation grants for private housing.

I also am conscious that substantial grant funding was provided for improving and adapting private houses in recent years. In the past two years, almost 22,000 householders benefited under the schemes. This year, I am allocating 12.4% of the housing budget or approximately €34.2 million to the grant schemes, compared with 13.2% in 2012. In allocating the available funding across all 34 city and county councils, I have done so in as transparent and as fair a way as possible. Between them, local authorities currently have contractual commitments from last year in respect of approved grants totalling €18 million. Local authorities were always encouraged to maintain continuity with regard to approving and paying grants and commitments carried forward into the new financial year always had first call on the available funding. This year, each authority was allocated the full amount of their contractual commitments. The balance of the available funding was allocated on the basis of each authority's share of the new applications on hand in January 2013. I believe this to be a fair and equitable way of apportioning the funding. However, I appreciate this approach has resulted in lower than expected allocations for some authorities. Deputy Fleming should be aware that, regrettably, only Laois County Council reported a zero commitment in respect of contractual commitments on approved works, which has had a major effect on the allocation to Laois in particular. I accept that particular difficulties may arise in some local authorities in the course of 2013 but have a contingency in place to deal with this. I have set aside a capital reserve of approximately €2 million and will consider applications from local authorities for a supplementary allocation once the initial allocation has been exhausted. I hope this gives Deputies some light at the end of the tunnel but it genuinely was a fair way in which to allocate the money, that is, first to the commitments that already existed and then on the basis of the applications that came in from the various counties.

Seán Fleming (Laois-Offaly, Fianna Fail)
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The Minister of State may assist in respect of transparency by publishing the list that went to each local authority, as Members have not had sight of it.

Jan O'Sullivan (Limerick City, Labour)
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I will revert to the Deputy in this regard.

Seán Fleming (Laois-Offaly, Fianna Fail)
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Second, the reason Laois County Council had zero commitments was it did not enter into commitments when it did not know it was guaranteed funding. It is being penalised for being prudent whereas in respect of the other counties, the Minister of State has indicated that €18 million of commitments were entered into without a guarantee of funding and consequently, they have access to the first tranche. In other words, the responsible local authority that was clearing its waiting lists and not entering into commitments has been unfairly penalised. I spoke today to the Minister of State's departmental officials in Ballina, who genuinely were very helpful, and a letter was sent today by Laois County Council seeking some additional funds from the capital reserve. The Minister of State will understand the point that because Laois County Council was highly organised in its business, it did not have commitments it could not meet and the council should not be penalised for that. During the course of the year, the Minister of State should make good a significant amount from that reserve.

My final point is I do not accept the premise of the Minister of State's comments on scarce capital resources within the Department of the Environment, Community and Local Government. Last year alone, there was a vote in this Chamber on the subject last week, €63 million of underspent funding on the water investment programme was handed back to the Department of Finance-----

Olivia Mitchell (Dublin South, Fine Gael)
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Okay Deputy. Please give Deputy Troy a moment.

Seán Fleming (Laois-Offaly, Fianna Fail)
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-----because of mismanagement of the capital budget in the aforementioned Department. Some of that money should be going to these people this year.

Robert Troy (Longford-Westmeath, Fianna Fail)
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A slash in capital budgets is not the answer. This is a time when the Government should be considering labour-intensive projects and these grants were a great incentive and stimulus to small contractors, many of which will make the point they actually kept them in business. It is typical of the current Administration that it is not looking at the bigger picture as disabled people or elderly people who cannot have the required works done to their houses will end up in long-term nursing home care. That will cost the State €800 per week when in some instances, all these people seek are grants of €2,000, €3,000 or €4,000 to get their houses adapted to meet their needs. A reserve of €2 million simply is not enough. The Minister of State must return to the Department where my colleague has highlighted areas in which she should seek additional resources. All Deputy Fleming and I are asking is to give elderly people and disabled people a sense of dignity in order that they can live in modest comfort for the rest of their lives.

Jan O'Sullivan (Limerick City, Labour)
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As the Deputy noted, this contingency fund is in place and the Department certainly intends to use it in a focused way. I also am considering the possible reduction in the upper limit of the grants because in some cases, the averages are only between 30% and 50% of the actual upper limits. This would be a way of spreading the money around further. I am also engaged in attempting to ascertain whether some kind of stimulus proposal can be put in place this year that would employ some of those people to whom Deputy Troy referred. Perhaps it would not necessarily be in this particular scheme but, for example, local authority houses could be retrofitted more extensively than is the case at present, which also would ease the burden of the payment of fuel bills for people in some of the older local authority houses. I am certainly conscious both of the need to stimulate employment and of the employment these grants provide. I protected the budget as best I could and my Department was obliged to spread it around as well as it could. I thank the Deputies for raising the issues and I will certainly consider the proposal by Deputy Sean Fleming that the information be published for the entire country.