Results 1,181-1,200 of 9,065 for speaker:James Browne

Written Answers — Department of Housing, Planning, and Local Government: Housing Provision (1 Jul 2025)

James Browne: Cost Rental is a new form of tenure which was introduced under the Affordable Housing Act 2021 and since then we have been actively building a pipeline of cost rental homes, with nearly 4,000 homes delivered to the end of last year. The Government has made a clear commitment in the Programme for Government to build more cost rental units through the LDA, local authorities and Cost Rental...

Written Answers — Department of Housing, Planning, and Local Government: Housing Schemes (1 Jul 2025)

James Browne: My Department provides funding under the suite of Housing Adaptation Grants for Older People and Disabled People, to assist those in private houses to make their accommodation more suitable for their needs. The suite of grants, which include the Housing Adaptation Grant for Disabled People, the Mobility Aids Grant and the Housing Aid for Older People Grant, are funded by my Department with a...

Written Answers — Department of Housing, Planning, and Local Government: Housing Schemes (1 Jul 2025)

James Browne: A key principle of the Housing Assistance Payment (HAP) is that eligible households source their own accommodation in the private rental market. The accommodation sourced by tenants should be within the prescribed maximum HAP rent limits, which are based on household size and the rental market within the area concerned. Since 11 July 2022, each local authority has statutory discretion to...

Written Answers — Department of Housing, Planning, and Local Government: Local Authorities (1 Jul 2025)

James Browne: Under Section 159 of the Local Government Act 2001, each Chief Executive is responsible for the staffing and organisational arrangements necessary for carrying out the functions of the local authority for which he/she is responsible and the requested information would be available directly from each local authority. On 15 October 2024, my Department published a Ministerial Action Plan on...

Written Answers — Department of Housing, Planning, and Local Government: Housing Schemes (1 Jul 2025)

James Browne: Affordability and the chance to own a home are at the heart of the Government’s housing policy. As detailed in the Housing for All strategy, the Government has introduced a number of measures to support households and individuals wishing to purchase a home, as well as increasing the overall supply of new homes, with an ambitious target of 300,000 new homes up to 2030.  The...

Written Answers — Department of Housing, Planning, and Local Government: Housing Schemes (1 Jul 2025)

James Browne: There are a number of housing estates across the country – including a number in the village in the details supplied - that rely on Developer Provided Infrastructure (commonly called DPI) for their water services. These estates have not been taken in charge and their water services are not connected to the Uisce Éireann network. In June 2023 more than €3.3 million of...

Written Answers — Department of Housing, Planning, and Local Government: Rental Sector (1 Jul 2025)

James Browne: Cost Rental is a key element of the Housing For All strategy to improve affordability in the rental sector and to provide secure, long-term homes for moderate-income households. Though it was introduced in 2021, cost rental delivery is accelerating, with over 3,600 homes already delivered by the end of 2024, and a substantial pipeline now in place. My Department is providing significant...

Written Answers — Department of Housing, Planning, and Local Government: Housing Provision (1 Jul 2025)

James Browne: Government is fully committed to delivering affordable housing at scale, and continuing to accelerate housing supply across all tenures. A comprehensive implementation strategy is in place to support the various affordable housing schemes now being delivered by a range of delivery partners. Overall, nearly 13,000 affordable housing solutions have been delivered since the launch of Housing for...

Written Answers — Department of Housing, Planning, and Local Government: Housing Provision (1 Jul 2025)

James Browne: This Government is committed to delivering more homes and has clearly recognised that a step-up in terms of scale and pace of delivery of all housing, including affordable and social housing, is required. This ambition to do scale up delivery is evident in the recently approved Revised National Planning Framework, but it will be important that as we zone more land, that the servicing of...

Written Answers — Department of Housing, Planning, and Local Government: Public Private Partnerships (1 Jul 2025)

James Browne: I propose to take Questions Nos. 28, 31, 63, 82, 98, 108, 432 and 470 together. The clear focus of this Government is to increase the supply of new build social and affordable homes. This is key to addressing the housing challenge and in particular preventing and ultimately eliminating long term homelessness, and that unquestionably must be the priority for all local authorities. The...

Written Answers — Department of Housing, Planning, and Local Government: Local Authorities (1 Jul 2025)

James Browne: Firstly, it is important to acknowledge that Local Property Tax (LPT) represented on average just 6% of total local authority revenue income in 2023. In general terms, funding from Central Government to local authorities increased by 83% from €3.69 billion in 2018 to almost €6.73 billion in 2023. There are variances across the country in terms of LPT levels but it is...

Written Answers — Department of Housing, Planning, and Local Government: Water Services (1 Jul 2025)

James Browne: This Government is delivering a sustainable funding path to further enhance the ongoing significant improvements in our public water and wastewater services. The Uisce Éireann Strategic Funding Plan 2025-2029 was approved in November 2024 and sets out an ambitious capital investment plan to make necessary improvements to water and wastewater infrastructure including new capacity to...

Written Answers — Department of Housing, Planning, and Local Government: Housing Provision (1 Jul 2025)

James Browne: The tables below detail the number of live applications, at various stages of approval, currently being processed by my Department on behalf of Galway City and County Council. Galway City Council live applications under SHIP Stage 1 Stage 2 Stage 3 Stage 4/Single Stage/Turnkey 2 5 0 2 Galway City Council...

Written Answers — Department of Housing, Planning, and Local Government: Rental Sector (1 Jul 2025)

James Browne: On 10 June 2025, the Government approved stronger tenancy protections and greater certainty for the rental sector, including the introduction of a national rent control, as part of a suite of measures to boost the supply of new homes and secure and grow the availability of rental accommodation. The Residential Tenancies (Amendment) Act 2025 was signed into law on 19 June 2025. The Act...

Written Answers — Department of Housing, Planning, and Local Government: Planning Issues (1 Jul 2025)

James Browne: The timing between a planning permission being granted and construction commencing is influenced by myriad factors, many of which are often project specific. These can include, among others, a developer's capacity to take on multiple concurrent projects, the time taken to deliver supporting infrastructure in advance of commencement, ability to secure finance, not proceeding because the...

Written Answers — Department of Housing, Planning, and Local Government: Wildlife Protection (1 Jul 2025)

James Browne: The National Parks and Wildlife Service of my Department is currently undertaking an important project to update wildlife legislation. This includes the Wildlife Act 1976, the Wildlife (Amendment) Act 2000, the European Communities (Birds and Natural Habitats) Regulations 2011 and significant regulations made under these provisions. The project is examining closely the effectiveness of our...

Written Answers — Department of Housing, Planning, and Local Government: Building Regulations (1 Jul 2025)

James Browne: The Building Regulations set out minimum standards for the design and construction of buildings and works to ensure the health and safety of people in and around buildings. The primary responsibility for compliance with the requirements of the Building Regulations rests with the designers, builders and owners of buildings. Following the completion of a comprehensive review of Part B (Fire...

Written Answers — Department of Housing, Planning, and Local Government: Housing Schemes (1 Jul 2025)

James Browne: I propose to take Questions Nos. 40, 49 and 51 together. My Department provides Exchequer funding to local authorities under the Housing Adaptation Grants for Older People and Disabled People scheme, to assist people in private houses to make their accommodation more suitable for their needs. The suite of grants include the Housing Adaptation Grant for Disabled People, the Mobility Aids...

Written Answers — Department of Housing, Planning, and Local Government: Housing Provision (1 Jul 2025)

James Browne: I propose to take Questions Nos. 41 and 77 together. Housing for All includes a commitment to review income eligibility for social housing. From this review, completed in November 2021, it was recommended moving five local authorities from Band 3 to Band 2, ensuring the income eligibility thresholds better reflect housing costs in those counties. Government also agreed to increase the...

Written Answers — Department of Housing, Planning, and Local Government: Domestic, Sexual and Gender-based Violence (1 Jul 2025)

James Browne: The response to Domestic, Sexual and Gender-Based Violence (DSGBV) is a cross-Departmental and multi-agency issue, with overall policy coordinated by the Department of Justice. Responsibility for the development and provision of services to support victims of domestic violence, including the provision and operational funding of domestic violence refuge services, rests with my colleague the...