Alice-Mary Higgins (Independent) | Oireachtas source

I move amendment No. 40:

In page 17, between lines 8 and 9, to insert the following: “Report on vacant units in LRD development

17.The Minister shall, within 18 months of the passing of this Act, lay a report before both Houses of the Oireachtas outlining the number of completed housing units under the LRD process which remain vacant.”.

This amendment and amendment No. 41 relate to the same issue and the fear I have that is derived from and grounded in what we have seen emerge in respect of previous measures. I refer to the fact that we may not see development happening at the required scale and that we may not see large-scale developments being built. My other concern is the issue I mentioned earlier in respect of the possibility of residential units being left vacant. I have specified 18 months in this amendment, but I am open to a different length of time being cited. Amendment No. 40 proposes that "within 18 months of the passing of this Act", and it could be 24 months if more time is needed, a report would be laid before the Houses of the Oireachtas outlining how many of the completed housing units emerging from the LRD process remain vacant. I put in 18 months to give some time for the building to happen. I do realise, however, that few developments will have been completed in 18 months. Apparently, as well, they are all going to be taken to the High Court and the Court of Appeal in the next 18 months.

What I am trying to get to is the issue of vacant units. If we are to have large-scale residential developments, the first thing we need is for them to be built. That is where a lot of our "use it or lose it" clauses come in. In addition, however, units in such developments must be occupied. The reality is that we have housing developments and apartment buildings in the city centre with large numbers of units vacant. That issue is not being addressed by a vacant property tax, so I wish to ensure that we have some measure or signal from the Government in the Bill which is a form of stick in this context, because those units are needed. It would be made it clear that not only do we want developers to build residential units but also to take action to ensure those units are occupied. I refer to ensuring that they are homes and not investment products.

In that regard, amendment No. 41 is intended to go further in trying to tackle the dangers in this area. I would refer to inadvertent dangers, except that warnings have been given in this regard but not acted on. I hope that these would, in fact, be inadvertent dangers in the context of planning permission becoming a commodity rather than a mandate to build homes. In that context, in this amendment I have asked that within 12 months, and it could also be either 18 months or 24 months, of the passing of this Bill - and I reserve the right to bring a new version of the amendment forward on Report Stage if the Minister is not minded to accept this one - that the Minister would lay a report before the Houses of the Oireachtas to tell us what proportions of the sites granted planning permission for large-scale residential developments have not had construction commenced on them. We do not want to replicate the situation with the SHD process, where years later we ended up with less than 50% of what was envisaged commenced. It was one third at one stage, but I think it has reached close to the half-way mark now. Amendment No. 41 also refers to the report detailing the proportion of those sites granted large-scale residential development planning permission that have subsequently been sold. I refer to them having been sold as a product in the form of a site with planning permission. Equally, the amendment seeks that the report to be laid before the Houses of the Oireachtas would also detail "the proportion of land, expressed in hectares, which is the subject of LRD planning permission and is owned by real estate investment trusts".

Regarding housing and property, and future interest in and prospects for property, as commodities contradicts our aims in many regards. I say that because it works on the logic of scarcity, of added value and of keeping demand constantly at a point of desperation. In many cases, that is what adds value. We need active measures to track where housing is becoming a commodity rather than, crucially, homes. The housing market and the speculative property market are, therefore, often at odds. Amendment No. 41, in particular, gives the Minister the chance to track for us what is happening with these LRDs. I refer to finding out if these planning permissions are becoming commodities or if they are going to translate into real homes.