Colm Burke (Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

On the issue of assets and the transfer of local authority houses, I understand that when the Bill is passed and the changes are made to the Cork city boundary, the new city area will have more than 10,000 local authority houses. That poses a major challenge in respect of maintenance and making sure adequate support services are provided for all those living in local authority houses. We need to address that issue. I am not criticising local authorities but expressing my overall view on how we manage local authority areas. I will cite one example of apartments in Blackpool that were built and managed by Cork City Council.The state of the apartments became so bad that the city council ended up having them all vacated. The building was refurbished and the voluntary housing agency, Respond, now manages it. At one stage, the flats at Blackpool were not a safe place to live but they are now the safest place to live in Cork city. The building has a gated entrance and is well managed and the residents are very well protected. When one is talking about managing a housing stock of more than 10,000 units it is important there are proper structures in place to make sure there is proper maintenance. Proper management is also needed to ensure the small number of tenants who cause problems are dealt with fast and efficiently at little lost to the city council and little disturbance to adjoining households and families. Adequate local authority housing and adequate management of the housing are important in expanding the city.