Conor Sheehan (Limerick City, Labour)
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3. To ask the Minister for Housing, Planning, and Local Government to provide an update on the development of the Government’s housing plan; if it will be published before the summer recess; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [35894/25]

James Browne (Wexford, Fianna Fail)
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I thank the Deputy for asking this question in relation to an update on the Government's housing plan. The programme for Government commits to the introduction of a new all-of-government national housing plan to follow Housing for All, underpinned by multi-annual funding. Work is well under way in my Department on the development of this new housing plan. A programme of targeted stakeholder engagement has been undertaken. Written submissions have been received from across government and from a range of external stakeholders, including State agencies, the community and voluntary sector and industry and academics. These submissions are being carefully considered and I have also met with many stakeholders to hear at first hand what actions they think should be reflected in the plan. I am committed to its finalisation and publication as soon as possible.

It is essential, however, that this plan align with the timing of the outcome of the national development plan review process being undertaken by my colleague the Minister for Public Expenditure, Infrastructure, Public Sector Reform and Digitalisation.

This will allow for the plan to be underpinned by the required multi-annual funding across not just my Department but across government. This will ensure a whole-of-government approach that tackles the challenges we are facing to support people who are experiencing homelessness or trying to access a home to buy or rent. In the meantime, as Minister, I remain focused on ensuring that we bring forward urgently every measure possible to support housing delivery in the short term and to place us on a longer-term sustainable pathway that will meet the housing needs of all our people and communities.

Conor Sheehan (Limerick City, Labour)
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The plan was supposed to be published in July. I understand from the Minister said and what we have seen in the media that it will be delayed until September. We know the Government has a target to deliver 303,000 homes by 2030 and that the target will be missed again this year by around 10,000. Will the Minister give the House an outline of what measures to scale up delivery are being considered and what he will do about uncommenced planning permissions? Can he guarantee in line with the NDP review that the funding needs of the utilities such as Uisce Éireann will be met on a multi-annual basis? A key recommendation of the Housing Commission was that social and affordable housing be scaled up to 20% of all housing stock. Will that recommendation be heeded in the new plan?

James Browne (Wexford, Fianna Fail)
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We are engaging with all the stakeholders regarding our new housing plan. The housing plan will follow the NDP. When that is finalised, the NDP will clearly set out the funding available for the Department of Housing, Local Government and Heritage and other Departments that are key in delivering the infrastructure we need to deliver the housing we need. It is in that context that the housing plan will be developed. We have already taken significant measures. We are not waiting for the housing plan to start taking the measures we need to take. We have already agreed to preserve the existing planning permissions for properties that may be about expire. We have established housing activation offices and increased the powers of the LDA. In the autumn, we will have a clear suite of planning exemptions to free up the time of our planners. We have also established An Coimisiún Pleanála. This week, there was further agreement to minimise the workload of local authorities by reducing the four-stage process for delivering social housing down to a single stage.

Conor Sheehan (Limerick City, Labour)
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The Minister did not address the recommendation from the Housing Commission to increase social and affordable housing to 20% of all stock. This badly needs to be done. It is a key plank of the commission's recommendations. I hope the Minister might be able to give us an outline of when each section of the Planning and Development Act will be enacted, including timelines, and whether he intends to look at tweaking the croí conaithe and secure tenancy affordable rental investment schemes to make them more viable for developers in smaller cities outside Dublin.

James Browne (Wexford, Fianna Fail)
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The vast majority of the Act will be commenced by the end of this year. We have already started to commence it with the commencement of the urban development zone sections and the establishment of An Coimisiún Pleanála. The State is delivering approximately 50% of all housing solutions, including from the private sector Part V. Our ambition is to continue delivering as much social and affordable housing as can be delivered by the State. We really believe in the delivery of social and affordable housing but if we want to get housing delivery for this country, we have to activate the private sector and that is why we are engaging with many decisions to not only facilitate the quicker delivery of social and affordable housing but also activate the private sector so we can get up to the delivery of 50,000 or 60,000 homes per year, which is what we need to do so that everybody has the housing solution that they need and can afford.