Eoghan Murphy (Dublin Bay South, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

Perhaps I could have a little more time so that I can address all the different issues that were raised. I apologise for being late. Although I was paired, I wanted to be present for the votes in respect of my Department.

Senator Devine said that we should not be just making statements and that the Government should be doing more. The solution she pointed to was a meeting that is happening next door. She said that we should set aside politics but she then made an inherently political speech which showed no acceptance that progress has been made. If we are going to work together on the issue, which we need to do, and the Fianna Fáil Party has said that we will move this outside of the political space, we must be fair and recognise when things are happening and also when things are not happening, we must try to find solutions to them. She bemoaned the fact that no legislation was before the House today. The last legislation in this House passed before the recess was the extension to planning to allow housing to continue to be built where the extensions were not in place. She said that nothing new had been done, whereas in June I signed into effect the order to allow the new fast-track planning process for an Bord Pleanála. There are now 5,000 homes on the books under the new faster process which will be built.

Senator Devine also said the Government is not doing anything differently. That is not true. Rebuilding Ireland is a new plan to build more in this country and address all of the issues that have been raised here today and it is making progress. There has been an increase of more than 40% in planning permissions since this time last year, an increase of more than 40% in construction commencement notices since this time last year, and an increase of 33% in Dublin of people connecting to the ESB grid since this time last year. Do we have to do more? Of course, we do, and that is why very recently I announced that we are increasing our output and building social housing homes directly by 30% for next year. That is why we had a housing summit and came up with new ideas that can help with homelessness, for example, the homeless inter-agency group. I ask people not to make this a political space but that we recognise what is working, and also see where we can do more and let us work together to achieve it.

When we look at the deep problems with homelessness, and the Taoiseach has said that it is a stain on our society, we have difficulties with individuals and we have difficulties with families who are experiencing homelessness. Later on today or early tomorrow morning, I will release the latest figures on homelessness. What they will show is that the number of homeless families nationally is up. I can speak about a number of aspects of that, but it will show that the number of homeless families in Dublin is down. Clearly, there is a significant amount of work to be done. Recently I held a housing summit to consider this problem, in particular because some of the things I was seeing during the course of June and July made me realise that we needed to bring the local authorities together to really get a proper grip on solutions.

The new inter-agency group that will be chaired by Mr. John Murphy is about bringing together the resources that are already being invested to ensure they are being invested in the best way and to make sure that all the wrap around supports that we put in place are working. We announced exit co-ordinators to help people who exit homelessness to prevent them from falling back into homelessness. I announced a national director for Housing First and an additional 100 places for Housing First because that model works. We know it works and we want to expand it.

The HAP place finder service, which is working in Dublin and Cork, is now being rolled out nationally. For landlords, we now have a requirement that where they are giving a notice to quit they have to notify the Residential Tenancies Board and that means we can get services in early to help those people. We know that prevention when it is early works. We know that if somebody presents with a notice to quit to a local authority, with one week to go, more than likely he or she will fall into emergency accommodation but if we can get to him or her when the notice to quit is actually served, we can help that person stay in that accommodation with the services that are there or find new accommodation so that he or she does not have to go into emergency accommodation. We are looking at the refusal policy as well to make sure that people who refuse an offer of social housing homes have the opportunity to live in what they see as the best home for them but also that they are not blocking other people from perhaps taking advantage of a home that could be offered to them at the same time.

Yesterday, I announced a new scheme under the existing mortgage to rent scheme with the new housing body in Limerick. That will protect people in their homes. Some 40% of the finance will come from my Department and the debt will be written off. I think this will be a game changer. We want to see more housing bodies moving into this space under the existing mortgage to rent scheme. Within a few weeks, I will put out an expression of interest under a new aspect of mortgage to rent that will involve a new line of financing. I think that will be very helpful.For the past nine quarters, we have seen a decrease in the number of people in long-term mortgage arrears, which is a positive development. Between now and the end of the year, we will have 200 new beds in terms of spare capacity for homeless individuals. The homelessness budget has doubled since 2014. In addition, we have €45 million for family hubs. Family hubs are our first response. They are far better than hotels and bed and breakfasts. There are 27 families in the Mater Dei facility. Since June, half of them have moved on to sustainable accommodation; the other half have not moved yet but we are working with them. When we look at Limerick and the problem they have with homeless families there - I spoke to the CEO about this yesterday - they have a programme using the hub money so that almost all of those families will either be in hubs or permanent accommodation before the end of the year. Progress has been made, resources are being invested and good work is being done both by local authorities and the voluntary sector. I recognise we have to do more. We also have to recognise that sometimes we can put every support possible through social protection, the health services and the voluntary sector into providing housing supports for people and it will not be enough. It does not mean that we cannot and should not do more but sometimes it will not be enough.

The Government is doing a lot more when it comes to social house building and we are not outsourcing into the private sector. That is why when I talk about our build numbers for next year I am talking about what the local authorities and the housing bodies will build. I am talking about that 3,800 number, which was going to be 3,000 until just a few weeks ago when I changed policy. No longer will local authorities be in the market competing with young families to purchase houses. They will move their resources and build directly as a result, which means a 30% increase that will be 3,800 units. This year we will build four times more than what we built in 2015. We are coming from a low number but every year we are ramping up and doing more. That 3,800 is before we count Part V and void conversions. If we include those, it is 5,000. If we look at the conservative number for builds next year, which is 20,000, one quarter of the stock next year will be social housing homes that the local authorities will own. When we count in acquisitions as well which will come into the housing stock and long-term leases, it brings us up to just under 8,000. So we are not too far off the 10,000 we should have in a steady state. This is only one year into Rebuilding Ireland. Progress is being made but we now we can make more. I want to have a principle here that will outlive any Ministers, whether it is me or a Minister who comes after me, that a certain percentage of stock being built every year is social housing stock and that we are not relying on Part Vs to meet that social housing stock or that it be considered as an add-on but that we are building it directly. That principle will be there so that we know that no matter when we face a time of crisis in future, there will already be houses being built for our most vulnerable citizens who need our support. It is the right thing to do and is something this Government believes in doing.

The local authorities are currently preparing land management plans that will come back to me at the end of this month and by the end of October, we will have detailed targets for each local authority on what they are going to deliver. If we are to have confidence in our numbers, we need to know exactly what is happening and that is the purpose. One of the outcomes of the housing summit was a new delivery unit in my Department to work with the local authorities for those new targets. I was with the housing bodies down in Limerick yesterday at their two day conference. We talked about the increasing scale and more that they can do. I made the point to them directly in my speech to the conference about the need to make sure they are building more homes for the elderly in community settings and also for the less abled. We need to make sure there are new homes being built that will not all be three-bedroom houses with an upstairs and downstairs. It will not work for everyone and we have to make sure they are being developed in the right settings. Recently I announced €12 million in additional funding for the type of grants needed to adapt and extend homes for people.

When we look at the bigger picture in terms of the national planning framework which was published earlier this week, it is all about taking advantage of the built environment that we already have. Of the new growth of 1 million people over the next 20 years, 40% will be in existing built-up areas. When we look at Limerick and the Georgian core, at the moment we have fewer than 1,000 people living there. It is not a sustainable way to grow a city. We know that Dublin has not grown in a sustainable way either, as Senator McDowell has spoken about. I will come to that point in just a minute. The national planning framework talks about the ambitious plans for growth that we have for Limerick for its Georgian core and hinterland. If we can get housing bodies and local authorities to also link in with those plans, and they will have to because we will put it on a statutory footing, then we will be able to achieve building in the right area for all of the people's needs that we have in our society. Affordability is key. We have to look after people who have social housing needs. We have to make sure the private sector is building houses and that people can access those houses at an affordable price. We have some excellent models that have already been put out there and have been used such as the Ó Cualann model. I was there recently with Deputy Noel Rock. The council was able to gift the land for a nominal amount to the housing body, which worked with a finance house and the city council to make these houses affordable to buy with a mortgage that was about €1,000 less than what the tenant was paying in rent. It was fantastic for the person I was fortunate to meet that day moving into her new home. We have affordable-to-buy models that can work. The task now is to make them work at scale which is something about which I was talking to the housing bodies yesterday in Limerick.

There are challenges in affordable-to-build in terms of certain solutions, in particular with apartments. People have mentioned height and other things. Next week I will make announcements of new decisions we are making in that area to help affordability when it comes to building, in particular build-to-rent where we can do a lot more. We have to have affordable schemes. We have to look at affordable finance for people who are borrowing. We have to look at criteria for people to access affordable homes. After the budget, I will be able to speak more about that. We know we will have affordable-to-build on the O'Devaney Gardens site, which is a site of considerable scale. We have the Ó Cualann model and we know it works but also the Government has provided €200 million in infrastructural funding, which essentially is a forgoing of the development levies and contributions to open up landbanks more quickly because we know they can be built on. It is something that is happening. I am about to sign the contracts on a number of those sites. Over the lifetime of the local infrastructure housing activation fund, LIHAF, programme, it will deliver 23,000 extra units. The average price for a two or three-bedroom property in 70% of those projects will be under €320,000. It is important to do that.

When we come to vacancy, we know it is not just about building new homes even though that is the focus of everything we do. "Build, build, always build" is the mantra in the Department. We also have to manage existing stock. In vacancy we think there might be potential but we have to be cautious when we talk about the numbers. We have to stop talking about 190,000 vacant homes. It is the figure the CSO came up with but we know within that figure are homes that were in probate, homes between lettings, homes on the market for sale and homes that are not in demand areas. We drilled down into those numbers as part of a desktop exercise in June and we believe the accurate figure in terms of vacancy in areas in high demand is more like 25,000. That was in June. Having spoken primarily to the Dublin local authorities since then and based on the work they have done, we think it is less than that. Even if it is less than that and it will be 5,000 or 10,000 less than that, it is still a source of supply we can bring online. It is something we are going to do. The work on this has already begun. There is an empty homes unit in my Department. Each local authority has a vacant homes team. The main urban local authorities have to report back to me by October on their vacancy hotspots in terms of the numbers they know for certain we can take advantage of by the end of the year. We are making progress on vacancies. There needs to be a suitable incentive scheme there that will work for them. We know the repair and lease scheme has not worked to date and I will be making changes to it shortly. Any additional home is welcome, which is why we are looking at vacancy as a part of this. We have to change our planning laws because we know that in Dublin, above-shop living has huge potential. Dublin City Council thinks there are potentially 4,000 such homes but they are commercially zoned or commercially designated. I will bring forward changes to allow us to very quickly move those from commercial to residential. It will also apply for the ground shop. In some larger towns and villages there are vacant shops on the street that could be a house or home with someone living in them. It goes back to the principle of building and living where we have the infrastructure already. It will be great for regenerating the towns and villages.

Coming to the point about the national planning framework and Dublin, it has been published and I think Members would enjoy looking at the document in detail because there are a lot of good things in it. We anticipate that of the growth by 1 million people between now and 2040, 25% will be in Dublin. Dublin has not grown efficiently. Sprawl is choking it and if it continues to grow in the way it has been, it will kill off Dublin and the rest of the country. If 25% of that growth is for Dublin we want 50% of it to happen within the M50 ring. If one takes an aerial view of particular parts of the city and looks around the Naas Road and that corridor, one will see people selling cars, trucks and furniture. They are right by the M50, the Luas and the canal. This is fantastic infrastructure that taxpayers have invested in but the land around it has not been utilised in the most efficient way. We need to bring the four local authorities together for a new type of structure to manage planning across the four local authority areas. I agree with that. It will help to properly develop Dublin. We need to do it in other cities as well. When we look at Cork, Waterford, Limerick and Galway, we have landbanks there that can be used in more strategic ways. We will need entities to help manage those landbanks back into proper use for houses, schools, hospitals and everything else we need.

I spoke to the Attorney General about compulsory purchase order, CPO, powers. I have also written to him about it. We have to achieve a proper balance between the public interest and individual rights. It does not mean we cannot CPO properties. We do CPO properties. When we move to do a CPO, it is not because the Government wants the property, we just want it back in use. Recently Dublin City Council moved to CPO about 25 or 26 properties.Two thirds of them went back into the private rental market, which is great because there is a problem with the private rental supply as well, and one third went into leasing to the local authorities, which is good as well for social housing tenants. Those rights in the Constitution are not standing in our way. They did not stand in our way in terms of bringing in the vacant site levy, the register for which will begin next year. They do not stand in our way when it comes to compulsory purchase orders, CPOs. They did not stand in our way when it came to bringing in caps on rent, which we have done in the rent pressure zones, or when it came to the Tyrrelstown amendment. We have been able to find that balance and we will continue to look to see how we can further find that balance.

The rent pressure zones are working. This year, if the trends continue as they have in the first two quarters we will see that inflation in Dublin will be 3%, that is versus 8.5% last year. That is a significant difference for someone paying rent in Dublin but it is also working in other areas. Drogheda and Greystones came under the RPZ designations as a result of the changes in rent that have been happening there. We know about the loophole when it comes to substantial refurbishment and how people are using that to get around their RPZ obligations. We will be introducing a definition of that through the Residential Tenancies Board, RTB. If it needs to be put on a legislative footing I will do so.

We are also going to reform the RTB to make it into a proper regulator for the sector over a two-year change management programme but everything is about balance. If we are going to bring in further protections for renters, which we are, we have to make sure that we are doing something for landlords. We cannot force people to be landlords. People complain about there being too many foreign landlords in this country. If they want the foreign landlords out then they will have to make sure there are enough domestic landlords as well, and that means incentivising them; making sure there are enough there and the incentives work for them. There is more we can do on that side and that we will do as well.

I am almost ready to conclude. Thank you, Acting Chairman, for the extra time. To speak to the points you raised yourself about pyrite and mica, we have had a number of conversations about that and a number of meetings. You are very dedicated to this and I completely understand that. I know it is a very serious problem for people in Mayo and Donegal in particular. There are a number of houses in both those counties that are in local authority ownership and we have a responsibility for those houses and for the people living in them as well. The Minister of State, Deputy Damien English, has done a significant amount of work in this area. As per the conversation we had, I have raised the issue with the Minister for Finance, Deputy Donohoe, but I do not want to give you any false hope on whether there may be something in the budget. I also acknowledge the good work that has been done in terms of engineering solutions.

Senator Humphreys raised home sharing and short-term letting. It is a very important part of our economy and where it works it works fantastically. It is good for people who want to come here; it is good for the economy and it is good for cultural exchange and everything else but as I said before, home sharing has to mean home sharing. As we proceed to clarify this area we have to be cautious so that we do not have any unintended consequences. We have to make sure that home sharing can still continue but also we have to make sure that our laws are robust enough to make sure that people are not working around the planning laws that are in place. A licensing system is probably the best way to go. There is a group working on this. It will be led by the Department of Transport, Tourism and Sport but my officials will be part of the group.

I thank Senators for their time. I apologise for commencing late. I very much appreciate the contributions that were made and the genuine proposals that have been put on the table. The Government, working with both Houses of the Oireachtas, and with the Oireachtas committee, can find further solutions that can work not just for people that are homeless whom I know are in very difficult circumstances, but there is also a hidden homelessness in terms of the people who are renting, who cannot afford to save for a deposit and people who have had to move back home to try to save for a deposit or because they could not afford their rent. We have to make sure that we are doing everything we can at each part in the supply chain into the market to look after all of the needs of citizens in this country.