Richard Boyd Barrett (Dún Laoghaire, People Before Profit Alliance)
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Since I was first elected to the House in 2011, I have been warning the Government that the failure to build council housing and the policy of selling off land and assets by NAMA, which could have been used for public and affordable housing, would generate a disastrous housing crisis. For the first few years, the Government completely dismissed that warning. Now that we have a housing crisis, which has become an emergency, the Government has finally acknowledged it but if the announcement yesterday in the newspapers is anything to go by, far from the learning the lessons of its failed policies which have produced this crisis, the Government continues to persist with its addiction to privatisation and a dependence on private developers to provide the social and affordable housing we need when they patently will not do that because they are driven by profit. We have been calling for a new State agency that will deliver housing for six years. We said specifically that NAMA's assets and resources should be used to deliver social and affordable housing. Yesterday, the Taoiseach said that could be tricky because of state aid rules. Let us be clear for the public what they are. They are ideological, market driven rules of the EU which say the state cannot distort the market by building public housing or public infrastructure without private sector involvement. The Taoiseach says we cannot do that but we can have an agency, which will, according to the reports, assemble the hundreds of sites that are currently owned by the public and for the purpose of delivering housing, these land banks will then be sold to private developers to construct private social and affordable homes as well are as for commercial use. What on earth is the Government doing setting up a new public private partnership handing over public land which should be used now to provide public and affordable housing?

3 o’clock

I heard the Taoiseach say we do not just need council houses, we need affordable housing. I agree, but where is the evidence that private developers or the private sector are going to deliver either of those things? Private developers are in it for profit. Average house prices in south Dublin are now €560,000. What on earth makes the Government think private developers are going to make those prices affordable?

With regard to the local infrastructure housing activation fund, LIHAF, funding the Government promised would deliver some affordable housing, we discover in the case of Cherrywood that it may deliver as little as 2% of the overall development as affordable, and even that will not be affordable because it will be in the region of €300,000. What on earth is the Government doing? It is planning to hand over 800 public sites to this new agency which, if it has to comply with state aid rules, will be majority privately owned by private developers in public private partnerships. We look at what happened with Carillion during the week, where public private partnerships collapsed, resulting in schools in this country and across Britain being put in serious trouble because they were dependent on the private sector.

I would like clarity on this plan. I put it to the Minister of State that this is not the way forward. What we need is public housing built on public land by a public construction company and local authorities.

Damien English (Meath West, Fine Gael)
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thank the Deputy for raising this issue as it is very pertinent to the sustainable development of land in the coming years and ensuring we have the right structures and systems to deliver on our vision and ambition. The Deputy refers to an article in today's newspaper but it actually refers to a part of our national planning framework document which has been circulating here for the last year. I raised this issue recently at the Committee on Rural and Community Development because it is one we have flagged in Ireland 2040 as a mechanism to manage land. That is what we are discussing here and it is what I will focus on.

The forthcoming national planning framework, Ireland 2040 Our Plan, estimates that by 2040 our country will grow in population by 1 million people, who will need at least 500,000 new homes, half of which are likely to be in key cities. It is vital, therefore, that we implement planning policies that achieve compact, smart growth in both our urban and rural areas. Drawing on the positive experience and delivery achieved under the local infrastructure housing activation fund, LIHAF, which incentivised Departments and agencies, in collaboration with local authorities, to pool resources in delivering a major enhancement of supply of serviced lands for housing, I expect that the new national development plan being prepared by the Minister, Deputy Donohoe, on behalf of the Government will deliver a number of initiatives to support sustainable growth in Ireland's five cities and other large urban centres as well as in our small towns and villages. This will involve using existing land sites, particularly infill sites in built-up areas, which is a key element in preventing sprawl which is unsustainable and represents a backward step in proper planning. Central to this will be a new approach to the delivery and location of the homes that society will need over the next decade and beyond. We need an integrated approach to housing development and management of the land needed for housing, including publicly owned or local authority housing. We also need mechanisms put in place to ensure a plan-led and delivery-focused approach to securing compact smart growth in line with the national planning framework principles and priorities.

The Government also recognises that to ensure that plans get implemented and that housing is built in a more affordable way, both by the State and by wider housing providers, as well as being more affordable to buy and rent for our citizens and households, the State must take a stronger role and lead in managing its own lands for strategic Government policy purposes. Again, we discussed at the Committee on Housing, Planning and Local Government and at the Committee on Rural and Community Development the need for local authorities to be in a position of strength to manage land and to be able to dictate what happens on that land. We must not just zone it and walk away, but actually make it happen in places where we want it to happen.

Recognising this public policy need and the need for cross-Government work, the Government is considering the establishment of a new public development and renewal agency under the national planning framework that will work with local authorities and that will have the power and capacity either to use public lands or buy other lands in the right locations for future public and private housing provision that will be affordable for housing providers to develop and for people to buy or rent. It is not about selling off State land. It is about combining landbanks in order that housing is built in a sustainable way and in the right place according to the timelines we want and at an affordable price, which is exactly what the Deputy has wanted for years. He should not try to scaremonger and say it is about selling off State lands because it is not. It is about trying to manage lands. Whether we take this route, we have flagged it in the national planning framework and it is something we will tease out over the months ahead.

It is the intention that such an agency would work with local authorities in assembling and releasing key and strategic areas for renewal and revitalisation, and it will have access to publicly owned but redundant or underutilised lands suitable for redevelopment designated by the Government. Such an agency would also help to create a national centre of expertise in development and renewal to ensure that existing lands are utilised to their fullest and best extent, and in a manner which complements the sustainable planning and development of our urban and rural areas. The Government will be considering these issues fully in the context of the finalisation of the national planning framework and the national development plan in the coming weeks. It is to achieve proper land use and land management in order that we can achieve affordable housing, not just for the next two or three years, but for the next 25, 30 and 40 years. That is what we are about - looking ahead and putting the State in a position, with local authorities, to be able to manage land and deliver housing. We do not want just to talk about it but to make it happen. That is what we are considering here and it has been flagged in the national planning framework for the past year.

Richard Boyd Barrett (Dún Laoghaire, People Before Profit Alliance)
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With all due respect, I will acquaint the Minister of State with reality. There are 96,000 families who are waiting up to 15 years on housing lists because they cannot afford the prices in the market, either for rental or purchase. There are 8,000 people, including 3,000 children, in emergency accommodation. There are 70,000 people in mortgage arrears, many of whom face the possible repossession of their homes. There are tens of thousands of people who are being evicted or face potential eviction because of rent increases by the private sector which wants to make more profit from the current crisis.

Against that background, the Minister of State is talking about an agency which is going to hand over, partially or fully, public land to private developers who in turn, supposedly, are going to give us social and affordable housing when there is no evidence whatsoever they will do that. In Cherrywood, as I pointed out, a new town of 8,000 houses is being built. While the State has put a lot of money into that, and although it was on NAMA land that it sold to a private developer for a song, it appears we will only get 2% affordable housing for the money we put in. That is not going to deal with the crisis. There is no point in them building houses for €400,000 and €500,000 if the vast majority of people who work in this country or who are dependent on social welfare cannot afford them. In fact, that is what led to the last crisis, given we had houses being built in their tens of thousands that nobody could afford. What we need to do is build public and affordable housing on the public land we have and use the resources and cash of NAMA to build public and affordable housing that is not built for profit. Instead, what the Government is proposing is more privatisation.

I will give an example. Apollo House was sold to private developers and there is no residential or affordable housing there. What is going to happen to Hawkins House, the Department of Health building, which is another site that could be used for public housing? What about the motor taxation office? Properties are being sold off to private developers and the public are getting nothing back.

Damien English (Meath West, Fine Gael)
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I again thank Deputy Boyd Barrett for highlighting the need to have good land use policies. Our ambition with Ireland 2040 is to make sure we do not have a repeat of the housing crisis we have had in recent years which we are trying to manage our way through. The Deputy might not like how we are managing this but we added-----

Richard Boyd Barrett (Dún Laoghaire, People Before Profit Alliance)
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I see the reality.

Damien English (Meath West, Fine Gael)
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-----7,000 new social houses that were not there last year but which are in use this year. Some 25,000 households who were not in a house last year are in a social house this year. In the year ahead, there will be more than 8,000 new social houses available to the local authorities that were not there two years ago. Despite all the Deputy's complaining, we are making progress. We all accept it is not enough today to solve the housing crisis but adding thousands of houses every year is the only way we are going to solve that housing crisis. Despite what the Deputy would like us to do, we are making progress.

The discussion today is about making plans for the future. It is, of course, a matter for the Government and the relevant Ministers, in this case Deputies Donohoe and Murphy, to reflect on the most appropriate and effective structures to deliver on our ambitious plans in Ireland 2040. Again, it is about where we build the next 500,000 homes, where we locate people and how we compact our cities and ensure rural Ireland's towns and villages have life brought back into them. That is what it is about.

Richard Boyd Barrett (Dún Laoghaire, People Before Profit Alliance)
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It is about how people can afford to buy or rent them.

Damien English (Meath West, Fine Gael)
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As Minister of State, I have been tasked with chairing a new residential land management and development group within the Department on behalf of the Minister, Deputy Murphy, with the aim of overseeing and driving the strategic management and development of housing on State land, with monitoring and accelerating the delivery of housing on residentially zoned lands, particularly on strategic sites in areas of greatest demand, and with assessing the availability of residential development land. I am keenly interested in how we handle this, and it is an issue we have discussed at committee on numerous occasions.

A development agency is worthy of consideration at national level, as it can provide an opportunity for a new approach to Government land management that drives the renewal of strategic areas that are not being utilised to the full potential and delivers the strategic outcomes of the national planning framework.

What the Deputy wants us to do is what we are trying to do. On publicly owned lands, it is our job to deliver, and we will do so, thousands of social houses and affordable homes. We own approximately 800 sites, which will provide for in or around 50,000 social and affordable houses. The Deputy should not try to muddy the water. We are doing what we are doing and are making progress. He might not like that progress, but we are achieving it and are continuing on our journey.