Catherine Ardagh (Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I welcome the Cathaoirleach back to the House and wish him a happy new year. Although the Government seems to be making a large number of announcements regarding housing figures - many of which have contradicted previous announcements - the harsh reality is that there is a cohort of people, including families with children, who are living on the verge of homelessness having being served with termination notices by their landlords who are, in many cases, selling up. This week alone two such families have called to my office and to the council looking for assistance. I am very disappointed by the services on offer by the various local authorities for those who are not homeless yet but who are on the verge of homelessness. People in these circumstances are turning to organisations such as Threshold or the Mercy Law Resource Centre which are filling in the gaps left by the State. In a situation where the Government is claiming false wins in terms of allocations to those who move from rent allowance to the housing assistance payment, HAP, it is disgraceful that the local authorities are not doing more to help those in receipt of HAP to navigate the process with private landlords. We know how difficult it can be to get private landlords to accept HAP tenants in the first instance but more involvement on the part of local authorities with landlords could build trust and confidence for both tenants and landlords to ensure that the HAP system works better. It is important that we question to use of HAP to demonstrate an increase in social housing allocations as many local authorities are simply moving people from rent allowance to HAP. They are not actually increasing the allocation but simply changing how the figures look. I call on the Minister for Housing, Planning and Local Government to come to the House to address these matters, particularly how local authorities could facilitate those in receipt of HAP. Obviously, I am not saying that HAP is the solution - we need to ensure that we have a State-wide house building programme - but it is what is available at the moment.

The second issue I wish to raise relates to the backlogs and waiting lists at the Property Registration Authority of Ireland, PRAI, and the probate office. Applications in both offices are taking up to 11 months to process.In circumstances in which housing construction is set to increase, support will be needed from the PRAI and probate office. There appears to be a resource issue in these offices. I ask that the Minister outline to the House what he proposes to do to ensure that the backlogs in both offices are addressed and the time for processing applications reduced.