Results 2,341-2,360 of 11,114 for speaker:Damien English

Housing (Regulation of Approved Housing Bodies) Bill 2019: Second Stage (24 Sep 2019)

Damien English: I am glad the Deputy made it.

Written Answers — Department of Housing, Planning, and Local Government: Foreshore Issues (24 Sep 2019)

Damien English: The compliance with all relevant legislative or regulatory provisions is a matter in the first instance for the individual, company or local authority undertaking work. Section 3 of the Foreshore Act provides for the licencing of removal or disturbance of beach material from State Owned Foreshore, the area from the mean high water mark to the seaward limit of the territorial seas, where...

Written Answers — Department of Housing, Planning, and Local Government: Building Energy Rating Compliance (19 Sep 2019)

Damien English: New social housing, in common with all new dwellings, must comply with building regulations and current regulations require a typical dwelling to have a Building Energy Rating (BER) of A3.  Some 98% of all new dwellings are built to this standard. The Nearly Zero Energy Building (NZEB) performance for new dwellings represents an improvement in energy and carbon dioxide...

Ceisteanna Eile - Other Questions: Housing for People with Disabilities Provision (18 Sep 2019)

Damien English: Housing needs for people with mental health difficulties are considered in the national housing strategy for people with a disability. The strategy sets out the Government’s framework for housing delivery for people with disabilities and it was developed in conjunction with the Government’s mental health policy, A Vision for Change. Flowing from the strategy, local...

Ceisteanna Eile - Other Questions: Local Authority Housing Maintenance (18 Sep 2019)

Damien English: The issue of student accommodation is separate from this conversation. It is a very different issue. I am happy to discuss it with Deputy O'Sullivan because a lot of progress has been made on student accommodation. Some 6,000 new units have been built, 6,000 are currently being built and 7,000 are planned. Great progress has been made. It is probably unfair to students to generalise by...

Ceisteanna Eile - Other Questions: Local Authority Housing Maintenance (18 Sep 2019)

Damien English: Again, Deputy O'Sullivan has addressed many issues in one question. People often mention cases concerning HAP properties. There are more than 40,000 HAP tenancies. We have not received 40,000 complaints. The majority of these tenancies work well and the tenants are happy. They want something permanent in the long run and that is fine. Some do and some do not. HAP tenancies are often...

Ceisteanna Eile - Other Questions: Tenant Purchase Scheme Data (18 Sep 2019)

Damien English: I thank the Deputy for outlining our work in the past few years. I clarify again that the tenant purchase scheme is open, working and successful. It is a favourable scheme and quite a few people have managed to avail of it in order to buy their homes in recent years. It is not as if the scheme is closed. We are talking about making changes to it and we debated different possible...

Ceisteanna Eile - Other Questions: Tenant Purchase Scheme Data (18 Sep 2019)

Damien English: The purpose of the review was to allow the Department to look into this scheme in order to see what changes might be made, if any. There have been discussions about that. Regarding when the review was finished, it is within our Department and it has been feeding into discussions over the last year. There has been much debate in that context and many issues now have to be checked. It may...

Ceisteanna Eile - Other Questions: Tenant Purchase Scheme Data (18 Sep 2019)

Damien English: I want to be very clear. We have discussed this matter on many occasions in this House, at the committee and elsewhere.

Ceisteanna Eile - Other Questions: Tenant Purchase Scheme Data (18 Sep 2019)

Damien English: The review relates to the first 12 months of the 2016 scheme. Tenant purchase schemes have been in operation since the 1970s. The commitment was to review the first 12 months. Many issues have been raised and we will bring forward the suggested changes and recommendations as part of an overall package. It is not to be addressed on its own and many issues have fed into the scheme and the...

Ceisteanna Eile - Other Questions: Tenant Purchase Scheme Data (18 Sep 2019)

Damien English: I did not sense that there was any row. I just want to clarify that the scheme is open, working very well and it is a-----

Ceisteanna Eile - Other Questions: Tenant Purchase Scheme Data (18 Sep 2019)

Damien English: -----very generous and favourable scheme. People have been delighted to use it. Many people have told us not to change the scheme, while others have indicated that we should change it. That is where the debate will go in the weeks ahead. If we want to look at properly reviewing tenant purchase schemes, however, there also has to be an examination of succession rents, succession rights,...

Ceisteanna Eile - Other Questions: Local Authority Housing Maintenance (18 Sep 2019)

Damien English: The management and maintenance of local authority housing stock, including pre-letting repairs to vacant properties, is a matter for each individual local authority under the Housing Act 1966. Local authorities return vacant properties to use through their own resources, but my Department also continues to provide Exchequer support, under the voids programme, for properties that require...

Ceisteanna Eile - Other Questions: Tenant Purchase Scheme Data (18 Sep 2019)

Damien English: I propose to take Questions Nos. 38 and 58 together. The Housing (Sale of Local Authority Houses) Regulations 2015 set a commencement date of 1 January 2016 for the introduction of the tenant incremental purchase scheme of 2016. In Galway City, the number of homes sold under the current scheme in 2017 was eight, while a further nine homes were sold in 2018. The scheme in Galway city was...

Ceisteanna - Questions - Ceisteanna ar Sonraíodh Uain Dóibh - Priority Questions: Building Regulations (18 Sep 2019)

Damien English: I thank Deputy Ó Broin for raising this issue, which has been discussed a lot in the House in recent years. It is a very important issue and more cases are being brought forward. It is an issue in which the Minister, Deputy Murphy, the Department and I are very interested. I recognise the work of the Deputy and the committee on the issue. It is something of which we are certainly...

Ceisteanna - Questions - Ceisteanna ar Sonraíodh Uain Dóibh - Priority Questions: Building Regulations (18 Sep 2019)

Damien English: This is an issue we have discussed at length and we have been very clear on the State's responsibility. The State did not accept liability in the schemes mentioned by the Deputy. With regard to the pyrite scheme that has fixed more than 1,200 houses at this stage, and with regard to the mica scheme in Donegal that was announced in the budget, the defective products and issues were not...

Ceisteanna - Questions - Ceisteanna ar Sonraíodh Uain Dóibh - Priority Questions: Building Regulations (18 Sep 2019)

Damien English: Where the State was able to find a way to deal with defective products through the expert panels it has done so. We have managed to find schemes to do this. I repeat that the issue is mainly the undetermined exposure to the taxpayer. It is unquantifiable. We have tried to step in where we can with regard to some of the changes to the legal system. We have written to the Law Reform...

Ceisteanna - Questions - Ceisteanna ar Sonraíodh Uain Dóibh - Priority Questions: Building Regulations (18 Sep 2019)

Damien English: That is very clear and we are all in a good position with regard to building control mechanisms. Other issues can be addressed as we bring forward legislation. I understand the committee is supportive and it has made recommendations. They will be brought forward in the months ahead, which will give us a chance to deal with some of these issues as we put in place a system in which people...

Written Answers — Department of Housing, Planning, and Local Government: Local Authority Housing (18 Sep 2019)

Damien English: Choice Based Letting is a method whereby available social housing stock is let by being openly advertised by local authorities to persons on the social housing waiting list. This allows qualified applicants to 'register an interest' in available homes. Applicants can act on their own initiative to respond to adverts and express an interest in dwellings that they would like to live in,...

Written Answers — Department of Housing, Planning, and Local Government: Legislative Programme (17 Sep 2019)

Damien English: The target date for the publication of the Marine Planning and Development Management Bill set out in the Climate Action Plan to tackle Climate Breakdown is Q4 2019. Once the legislation is published, it will then be a matter for the Oireachtas to consider. If the Bill is enacted, it will require further enabling measures post enactment to bring the new regime into operation including...