Kieran O'Donnell (Limerick City, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

Yes. I will outline the current position. The Senator raises an important point. In my role, the issue of providing housing for older people in an area has come up over the years.

Under action 6.3 of Housing for All, local authorities have been mandated to consider the housing needs of older people through the housing need and demand assessment, HNDA, framework and to feed this into their housing strategy as part of their development plan process. The HNDA framework assists local authorities to develop long-term views of housing need and demand, including estimating the needs of older people in the local authority area. The HNDA provides a robust evidence base to support decisions about housing supply investment and housing-related services that inform a national housing profile. Guidance on the preparation of a HNDA assessment was published by the Department in April 2021 together with a HNDA tool to estimate the need according to tenure type.

Section 4 of the HNDA framework includes a requirement for local authorities to assess the need for specialist provision for housing requiring specific solutions suited to specific needs, including for older people. The framework recommends that local authorities examine a number of data sources, which brings us back to the Senator's point, to estimate the level of need expected to arise over the period of the HNDA. Many of the relevant data sources in respect of older people are published on the HNDA data sources page on the website, including data relating to housing adaptation grants and ESRI population projections, allowing local authorities to understand the age profile of residents at that time.

More granular information on the housing needs of older people is available at local level through age-friendly technical advisers, of whom there are 31. For the past two or three years, every local authority has had an age-friendly technical adviser. Their input into housing of older people, including in relation to forward planning through the housing strategy, provides improved data on this group. Age Friendly Ireland also has an age-friendly officer in each local authority. The Department will continue to work to ensure all local authorities appropriately assess the needs of older people in any area.

What are the changes this year? We have a new census. We intend to review the HDNA framework, including the tool and underlying demographics, income, housing and rental price scenarios and assumptions this year, when the detailed census becomes available. As a critical element of this work, the ESRI will update its research on structural housing demand. It is expected the work will be completed towards the end of this year.

We are doing a revised national planning framework. It will be approved by the Government by May next year. I am involved with our advisory group on that. It will allow for the update of the HNDA. There are data sources. We are conscious of the point the Senator makes and are looking to upgrade how the housing needs assessment works against the background of the new census results and the revised national planning framework.