Results 12,741-12,760 of 15,555 for speaker:Eoghan Murphy

Ceisteanna - Questions (Resumed) - Ceisteanna ar Sonraíodh Uain Dóibh - Priority Questions: Housing Provision (9 Apr 2019)

Eoghan Murphy: The Deputy has not told me one measure that he would take if an emergency was declared or what one new power that would give to abrogate constitutional rights.

Ceisteanna - Questions (Resumed) - Ceisteanna ar Sonraíodh Uain Dóibh - Priority Questions: Housing Provision (9 Apr 2019)

Eoghan Murphy: The challenges that we face today are very different to the challenges that we faced in housing eight years ago with 3,000 ghost housing estates and hundreds of thousands plunged into negative equity and mortgage distress. It is not true to say that property rights trump other rights in the Constitution. There is a balance of rights and that is why we were able to bring in the vacant site...

Ceisteanna - Questions (Resumed) - Ceisteanna ar Sonraíodh Uain Dóibh - Priority Questions: Housing Provision (9 Apr 2019)

Eoghan Murphy: -----but even if it was constitutional, it would not be retrospective so it would not actually help people in tenancies today. We have to work to solutions that will help people without hurting them.

Ceisteanna Eile - Other Questions: Planning Guidelines (9 Apr 2019)

Eoghan Murphy: I thank the Deputy for the question. Under section 30 of the Planning and Development Act 2000, as amended, it would be inappropriate for me to comment on individual planning cases. Under Project Ireland 2040, including the national planning framework, the Government has taken a broadly welcomed lead on moving away from sprawl to more compact urban growth as a key mechanism to support...

Ceisteanna Eile - Other Questions: Planning Guidelines (9 Apr 2019)

Eoghan Murphy: It is true that Deputy Howlin engaged with me in respect of something that had been brought to his attention, as has the Minister of State, Deputy Stanton, in respect of concerns as to whether the densities are correct and to make sure we are not preventing developments from happening. The requirement of 35 to 50 dwellings per hectare for urban areas is the equivalent of 35 to 50 homes on a...

Ceisteanna Eile - Other Questions: Planning Guidelines (9 Apr 2019)

Eoghan Murphy: On foot of my engagement with Deputy Howlin, I did speak to my planners again about this issue around density. I spoke at the annual planning conference last week in Carrick-on-Shannon. The challenge of the right density was one of the key things that I spoke to. So often now, when we talk about the challenge we have in housing, it is actually a challenge around planning. We know more...

Ceisteanna Eile - Other Questions: Social and Affordable Housing (9 Apr 2019)

Eoghan Murphy: I propose to take Questions Nos. 67, 74 and 78 together. One of the Government’s key priorities is to address issues of housing affordability, including for low to middle-income households and workers. A multi-stranded approach is being taken to support such households in achieving home ownership, particularly those households earning annual gross incomes up to €50,000...

Ceisteanna Eile - Other Questions: Social and Affordable Housing (9 Apr 2019)

Eoghan Murphy: My responsibility is to provide an affordable housing sector, not for the benefit of any one public sector worker or any one worker in the economy, but to everyone in the country. We must have a functional housing sector that provides not just social housing or general housing but affordable housing as well. I am not responsible for the pay and conditions for anyone working in the public...

Ceisteanna Eile - Other Questions: Social and Affordable Housing (9 Apr 2019)

Eoghan Murphy: I thank the Deputy for his questions. One of the later questions deals with institutional investors. They are not hoovering up properties to the extent people think they are. We need to rebalance our housing sector away from over-reliance on individual landlords with one or two properties; we need to find a balance there. On the serviced sites fund, the second call has gone out from my...

Ceisteanna Eile - Other Questions: Vacant Sites Levy (9 Apr 2019)

Eoghan Murphy: I propose to take Questions Nos. 68 and 117 together. Under the vacant site levy provisions of the Urban Regeneration and Housing Act 2015, planning authorities are empowered to apply a vacant site levy of 3% of the market value of relevant vacant sites. These arrangements commenced in respect of vacant sites included on local authority vacant site registers prior to 1 January 2018 with...

Ceisteanna Eile - Other Questions: Vacant Sites Levy (9 Apr 2019)

Eoghan Murphy: Finance for small sites and particularly infill sites can be quite complicated because there can be many difficulties, as Dublin City Council found out recently when it looked at a particular site in the city centre. I am sorry I raced through my initial answer which contained considerable detail. There are 360 sites on the local registers. More than €400 million worth of land is...

Ceisteanna Eile - Other Questions: Vacant Sites Levy (9 Apr 2019)

Eoghan Murphy: This is not a revenue raising measure. We did not bring in the vacant site levy to bring in money. We brought it in to encourage the use of land for development. We will not measure this based on the amount of money we bring in but on the number of sites we get under construction as a result of bringing in the levy. As I said, development is taking place on 42 sites since we brought in...

Ceisteanna Eile - Other Questions: Vacant Sites Levy (9 Apr 2019)

Eoghan Murphy: -----the person is liable to pay €100,000 on that. We are seeing proof of that now. The levy we have put in place is moving sites from vacancy into construction but the important thing to note as well is that we are not just using the vacant site levy to get land moving. We have also got the Land Development Agency bringing forward State land to make sure we are progressing the...

Ceisteanna Eile - Other Questions: Private Rented Accommodation (9 Apr 2019)

Eoghan Murphy: I propose to take Questions Nos. 73, 101 and 111 together. I thank the Deputies for their questions. There are approximately 340,000 tenancies registered with the Residential Tenancies Board, RTB, of which approximately 310,000 are private rented tenancies. The majority of landlords, just over 70%, own just one property, with a further 16% owning just two properties. Almost 86% of the...

Ceisteanna Eile - Other Questions: Private Rented Accommodation (9 Apr 2019)

Eoghan Murphy: I thank the Deputies for their questions. Briefly, to respond to Deputy Wallace's comment, of course we can find individual sites and make a judgment based on an individual site for the scheme as a whole but it would be wrong to do that because we know under the vacant site levy that we have more than 300 sites now on the register-----

Ceisteanna Eile - Other Questions: Private Rented Accommodation (9 Apr 2019)

Eoghan Murphy: -----but more than 40 sites have now seen construction and development because of the levy. Moving on to the questions with which we are dealing, overall the impact to date has been very minimal. If we consider 2017, less than 1% of transactions were from large foreign institutional investors - that is based on either 2017 or 2018 data. Approximately 4.5% of tenancies are under the...

Ceisteanna Eile - Other Questions: Private Rented Accommodation (9 Apr 2019)

Eoghan Murphy: I thank the Deputies. In reply to Deputy Wallace, the housing sector in this country was dysfunctional for decades and it broke completely following the financial crisis. What we are trying to do now is rebuild it in a way that is sustainable so it will not crash again. There is a levy on vacant land and that is what we discussed in the previous question. In regard to our ambitions around...

Written Answers — Department of Housing, Planning, and Local Government: Legislative Reviews (9 Apr 2019)

Eoghan Murphy: I propose to take Questions Nos. 69 and 114 together. The Residential Tenancies Board (RTB) was established as an independent statutory body under the Residential Tenancies Acts 2004-2016 to operate a national tenancy registration system and to resolve disputes between landlords and tenants.   A number of measures have been introduced in recent years with the...

Written Answers — Department of Housing, Planning, and Local Government: Rent Pressure Zones (9 Apr 2019)

Eoghan Murphy: Last December, I published the Residential Tenancies (Amendment)(No. 2) Bill 2018 to deliver on a number of commitments flowing from Rebuilding Ireland and the commitments that I made to provide the Residential Tenancies Board (RTB) with additional powers and resources to deliver enhanced protections to both tenants and landlords. The Government has given priority...

Written Answers — Department of Housing, Planning, and Local Government: Private Rented Accommodation (9 Apr 2019)

Eoghan Murphy: I propose to take Questions Nos. 73, 101 and 111 together. There are approximately 340,000 tenancies registered with the Residential Tenancies Board (RTB), of which approximately 310,000 are private rented tenancies. The majority of landlords, just over 70%, own just one property, with a further 16% owning just two properties. Almost 86% of the registered rental housing stock is owned by...