Damien English (Meath West, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I know but they were being complimentary so I had no problem with that.

I thank you for the chance to answer some of the questions, a Leas-Chathaoirligh. Some of the issues were raised by speakers on a previous day in January while others were covered today. I do not have all the answers, but if there are any questions I do not answer I will forward any details to individual Members. I will try to provide the answers in order as best I can. Senator Clifford-Lee, who is not here at the moment, spoke about it being a key priority for Fianna Fáil. It is fair to say that it is a key priority for everyone, no matter what his or her party or background. Certainly, as a Government, it is a key priority for us. It is priority number one. That is why at the early stages when the Government was formed the Rebuilding Ireland - Action Plan for Housing and Homelessness strategy was put together. The idea was to focus the minds of all Departments and Government and to make housing the number one priority. Much work went into that and all political parties contributed. All political parties are represented on the Committee on Housing and Homelessness. The committee worked hard and came up with suggestions, many of which are in the document. It is fair to say that some political parties want to go further. I accept that, but I imagine the majority accept all that is in the plan and simply wish to push it further. That is acceptable as well.

As a Minister of State in the Department, along with the Minister for Housing, Planning and Local Government, Deputy Eoghan Murphy, anywhere I go I try to clarify that this is our party's number one priority. Everyone is committed to trying to resolve housing. We try to press this as hard as we can.

I wish to emphasise that local authorities are a key part to solving housing and dealing with it. I thank local authorities for their efforts during the past 18 months in putting the teams together. Now that they have the resources again, they are back in the business of delivering housing solutions. That is what they are best at and that is what they should be doing. It is something they wanted to do but they did not have the teams to do it.

Senator Martin Conway touched on how Governments - at least Governments I was part of - wanted to tackle this earlier, but the resources were not always available. Thankfully, they are available now. Apart from that, policy decisions were made by previous Governments - those not led by Fine Gael - that removed the power of local authorities in the delivery of social housing. That has had a major impact. It has taken us some time to put the teams back together, get local authorities focused on delivering housing and getting money into the system. That is all coming together now. That is why we should see more housing solutions this year and in the coming years as well.

People will judge and say that the housing action plan is not moving fast enough. Previously in the House I referenced the connection with the Action Plan for Jobs. Likewise, the first year of the existence of that plan, people began to doubt whether it was working because they could not see all the jobs coming on-stream. The Action Plan for Jobs was a five-year plan. It put in place numerous changes in the first 18 months that delivered hundreds of thousands of jobs over five years. Likewise, Rebuilding Ireland is a five-year plan. A total of €6 billion of taxpayers' money is the minimum committed, and it has increased as we have gone along. It will take five years to tackle this.

We said that in year one, or over 18 months, we would make changes that would deliver housing in year two and year three. That is now happening. Over 7,000 new homes came into the system last year. These included new homes that were direct build, purchased, acquired, leased and voids coming back into the system. These 7,000 houses were not available the previous year and are now in social housing. They are helping people to get houses. In total, 26,000 housing solutions were found for different people through all the housing schemes. Some were short term and some were long term, but it is all progress.

I am the first to admit to everyone here that it is not enough - I accept that. We have to keep pushing further. Thousands of people are still living in emergency accommodation and we have to deal with that. We will not rest in our Department - likewise Senators will not rest here, no matter what party they are from - until that is dealt with. We have to get those people affected into permanent accommodation and houses. We know that. That is our end goal and we are committed to doing it. That applies to every party, to one and all.

Senator Clifford-Lee raised the Vacant Housing Refurbishment Bill. My understanding is that it is still being discussed at committee. We have taken certain provisions from it and we have implemented them straight away. I brought through some exemptions recently on vacant properties. They were in that Bill. We acted on that Bill. We take on board good ideas when we can and we move on them as quickly as we possibly can. Some of that work is ongoing. We are not convinced that other provisions can be fully teased out the way Fianna Fáil is suggesting. However, we are working on it with that party to try to see how we can make it better, if we possibly can.

Progress is being made on social housing. Last year, over 4,000 people left an emergency situation in a house or home. That is progress. It is not enough when there are thousands, including children, still living in accommodation. No one, no matter what the party or Department one is in, wants to see children raised in hotels, bed and breakfast accommodation or emergency accommodation. That has to end. Thankfully, we are making inroads. This year, ahead of us, we will see an additional 8,000 social housing units coming on board. It should help us to get people out of hotels and into permanent housing. We know the numbers are still far too high and we have to move as fast as we possibly can. Many supports have been put in place to try to make it a little easier on those families and children in emergency accommodation. It is not satisfactory and it is not enough. The idea is to try to help a little while we try to build the new homes as quickly as we can.

The question of Permanent TSB and vulture funds was raised by several people. No proposals have come forward yet in respect of who is buying that loan book. This was discussed again in the Dáil today. People keep referring to vulture funds. That question is not even on the table yet.

Who or what is going to buy up these loan books? Loan books are sold on regular basis by different banks throughout the world. What is important is that people are protected in their homes regardless of who owns their loans. Those protections are there and they are the same whether it is Permanent TSB, Bank of Ireland or some other bank or fund. People are protected the same way. They do not change no matter who buys a person's loan. I want to be clear on that. We work a great deal with people to keep them in their homes.

In the past, I have heard those from Fianna Fáil referring to tens of thousands of people being forced out of their houses or losing their houses. That is not true and the figures do not back up the claim. There have been housing repossessions in recent years but the figure is not in the tens of thousands, as suggested by the way Fianna Fáil people talk. It is unfair to say that. It is scaremongering and such talk is making people afraid. The majority of people are protected in their houses. We help them to work through their mortgages. We have put supports in various Departments to make that happen as well. We will continue to do that. We know that in the context of the housing problem, it is best to keep people in their homes if we possibly can. We have made many changes to the mortgage-to-rent scheme to make it more of an option for people to stay in their homes when there is an unsustainable mortgage and we will continue to do that. That deals with Senator Clifford-Lee's concerns.

Senator Colm Burke referred to funding in Cork. I have been in Cork numerous times. There has been some progress but it is still not enough, something I imagine Senator Burke would agree with. Senator Burke is pushing hard, as are all the political representatives in Cork. We want to try to do more there. Cork City Council and Cork County Council have been given specific targets on social housing, affordable homes and local infrastructure housing activation fund sites. The funding is there to back it up. Part of our job in the Department is to drive the activity and to work with local authority members to make it happen even more quickly. That is what we are trying to do. Over 720 projects will deliver 12,500 houses throughout the country for social housing. About 3,600 of them are on site at the moment.We want to make that happen even faster and asked the local authorities at the recent housing summit to double, if not treble, that pipeline. We want them to really increase activity across all of their sites and will work with them on doing that.

Project Ireland 2040 is exactly as Senator Colm Burke outlined in terms of looking ahead and filling in the full jigsaw, rather than just putting in one piece here and one piece there. Under Rebuilding Ireland, we will get back to delivering over 10,000 social houses per year and the commitment thereafter is to build approximately 12,000 per annum, which is similar to what Sinn Féin wants. Its members are arguing for a minimum of 10,000 units per year and we agree with them. That is what we are trying to do but it will take a little time to get there. I wish we could do it faster but we cannot. However, we will get there and are committed to delivering the number of units that Sinn Féin, Fianna Fáil and others are seeking. We are on track to do that. Project Ireland 2040 is about that as well as being about overall long-term planning.

In terms of student accommodation, specific plans are in place in my Department, working with the Department of Education and Skills, which will deliver a lot more on-campus and close-to-campus student accommodation. Some of the projects are going through the planning system at the moment, with varying levels of success. There have been objections to some developments in Cork and other areas, which I understand. However, that is what the planning process is all about - analysing the proposals and working them through the system. I am glad to say that since we announced Rebuilding Ireland over 9,000 student accommodation units are being worked on and are coming through the system. We are committed to delivering over 20,000 such units over the term of Rebuilding Ireland. That is in play and can happen but we must also make sure we get the planning aspects right.

The cost of housing is an issue. The current regulations guarantee a better build but we are still trying to work on the costs. While it compares quite well internationally, that does not make houses any cheaper. We are constantly working to see how we can keep the cost of building houses down. We can intervene a lot in terms of the price of sites by making public lands available and funding ancillary infrastructure but it is important that we also keep an eye on the price of building actual houses. I am not familiar with the figures for the houses in Cork to which Senator Colm Burke referred but, in general, social housing units cost €200,000 or more to build, depending on their size. That is quite expensive but one is getting quite a strong family home for that price. Long-term leasing is being considered in the Department. Senators made specific reference to the Berlin model and in our rental strategy we are specifically trying to find new ways to encourage investment in the rental market that will give greater security, increase supply and improve the overall level of service for tenants. Many more people are choosing to rent and we are looking at new models for build-to-rent schemes and are making some progress in that regard. In that context, the German model is also being considered.

Senator Warfield raised a number of issues, including the disparity between mortgage and rent levels and he is correct in that regard. We all recognise and agree that current rent levels are not sustainable. That is why our focus is on increasing the supply of housing. It is predicted that the market will build about 23,000 new houses this year having built approximately 19,000 new houses last year. This new supply of houses will help all of the different housing sectors, including both social and private. We had thought that we would be doing well to get 20,000 units built this year but it looks like we will go beyond that. However, we need to build on that and get to a stage where we are delivering 28,000 houses by the end of the Rebuilding Ireland term. We will then commit to building approximately 30,000 units per annum thereafter.

As I said, Project Ireland 2040, the national planning framework is about making sure we have the housing supply coming on stream so that we can deal with the costs of housing and rents in the long term. We cannot fix the problem overnight but we will get a handle on it. I agree with Senator Warfield's point about mortgage repayments being more sustainable but I disagree with his view of the help-to-buy scheme. Experts have not said that it has contributed to an increase in the cost of housing. The scheme has helped thousands of people to buy a home who could not do so prior to its introduction. The aim of the scheme was to encourage the market to deliver homes for a cohort of people for which it was not providing housing. If one analyses the data closely, one will see that there are starter homes being built now that were not being built 18 months ago. I disagree with Senator Warfield on that point and would argue that the scheme has been a success. However, I accept his overall argument.

The Senator also asked about the affordable rental pilot scheme being developed by Dún Laoghaire-Rathdown County Council in conjunction with the Respond Housing Association and I will forward details on that project to him. It is but one pilot scheme and we would like to see a lot more such schemes, as would Senator Warfield and his party. The idea is to provide State-owned lands to bring forward more of those projects. We have asked the local authorities to look at those concepts and to bring forward proposals for their own lands. Likewise with affordable housing, the Minister, Deputy Eoghan Murphy, will announce the details of a scheme in the coming weeks. It is well designed and well worked out and there is ample opportunity to build over 10,000 affordable houses in the coming years. We hope to do more than that using State-owned lands. We have identified approximately 50,000 acres of public land which will be used for private, social and affordable housing. We look forward to working with all parties on that as time goes on.

I must also disagree with the Senator on the home loan product which does not encourage people to buy houses they cannot afford. Affordability is carefully assessed and there are caps in place. The product is attractive because people will know what their interest costs will be over the term of the loan, that is, 2% fixed for 25 years or a little higher for 30-year terms. People can budget for that which is a major factor when people who are trying to buy a home that they can afford. When interest rates increase, people find it harder to budget and manage their repayments. Our scheme can work in that context but we will not use it to enable people to take on debt they cannot afford. I can assure the Senator of that.

Senator Higgins raised a few issues relating to housing for people with disabilities and the disability strategy. I touched on that issue at the end of a previous debate with Senator Dolan but would be more than happy to take part in a specific debate on the issue in this House. Tomorrow we are due to discuss a few issues related to that area but if the Senators wish to schedule a specific debate on housing, I would be more than happy to participate.

There are strategies in place which have been extended out to 2021. Each local authority has been asked to bring forward its plans to provide accommodation for people with various disabilities in the present as well as to provide an estimate of what they will need in the future. In the past, such accommodation was provided in response to demand but we want to see a certain percentage of all new local authority accommodation being appropriate for people with disabilities. That is happening now and we have commitments from most local authorities at this stage. I am happy to analyse this with the Senators to see if the provision being made is sufficient. There are lots of different schemes to contribute to the costs of adapting accommodation which are being utilised in some cases but we can push them out more if necessary. A lot of disability groups are involved in various housing projects and we are happy to do more in that space if we can. In some ways, it is about bringing a focus to this, which I know Senator Dolan will do and further discussion in this House would be helpful in that regard.

Senator Higgins also raised the issues of a vacant house tax and a vacant site levy which are two different things. We had a discussion in this House on a vacant house tax recently and the Government made changes to the vacant site levy in the recent budget. The scenarios are different but both need a lead-in time. A decision was made to introduce a vacant site levy a couple of years ago. There was a lead-in time on that and it kicks in this year. People will be charged a levy on their properties this year. We are recommending an increase, based on discussions here and the Lower House, from 3% to 7% but that is different to a vacant house tax. The latter is being analysed at the moment but the constitutional advice is that there must be a lead-in time before any such tax is introduced. In other words, before we tax someone's house we must give him or her a chance to bring it back into use.

We are making changes to the Traveller accommodation budget. I am not happy that the money is not being spent. I met the chairperson of the national Traveller accommodation committee again today. We have set up an expert panel to examine how we can change the system and the laws to make sure that we spend the money allocated for Traveller accommodation. In my view, some local authorities are not pulling their weight in this space and are not providing enough Traveller specific accommodation. We must deal with that and will do so.

Concern has been expressed in this and the other House that the HAP scheme is failing, but 32,000 people are on that scheme and the majority of them seem quite happy with it. I accept that it does not work for everybody and that there can be problems, as with any tenancy. However, there is a misconception that participation in HAP prevents people from transferring to permanent social homes but that is not the case. In the last year, approximately 1,000 people who were in HAP tenancies moved to a permanent social house. There is a belief that if one is on HAP one will be left to one side and never considered for permanent housing but that is not true and the statistics do not back up that argument. I am happy to discuss that further with the Senator if necessary. The Senator raised a number of other issues which I will not be able to deal with today.

Senator Byrne made reference to a development on Lord Edward Street in Limerick, which I visited before work began. I am glad that it is now finished and was delivered on time. That was a brownfield site that was brought back into use along with some new properties as well. That is the kind of scheme that we want to do more of and I am glad that it worked in Limerick. I know that Senator Byrne drove that project. She also made reference to single person occupancy accommodation. We have asked the local authorities, at the design stage of housing projects, to bear in mind those on their housing waiting lists. Housing waiting lists include people with disabilities, older people and single people. Indeed, approximately 45% of most local authority housing waiting lists are comprised of single people who do not need three or four-bedroom houses. What comes forward in the plans should reflect the need that exists.

In terms of housing waiting lists more generally, I am glad to say that the figures have come down by about 4,000 over the last year. We can count that every year using the same criteria and can check the movement in that regard.