Darragh O'Brien (Dublin Fingal, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I thank Senators Kyne, Fitzpatrick, Casey and the Acting Chairperson for being here. I welcome the opportunity to update Members of the House on the progress being made on Housing for All. It is just over two years since the plan was published and although the landscape and environment in which we are operating has changed significantly, real progress is being made. While challenges remain, we continue to be agile and responsive in addressing these challenges head on and delivering an increasing supply of homes for all.

It is important to take stock of progress to date and I will provide the House with some detail on the continued innovation in Housing for All. This plan represents the most ambitious housing plan in the history of the State. The capital funding being provided in budget 2024, coupled with Land Development Agency and Housing Finance Agency investment, is at a record €5.1 billion for next year. We are starting to see significant delivery. In 2022 just short of 30,000 new homes were delivered. This exceeded our target by more than 5,000 for last year.

In the first nine months of this year, just short of 22,500 new homes were delivered, a 9% increase on the same period last year. Some 31,500 homes were completed in the rolling 12-month period to the end of September 2023. This is the third quarter in a row where the figure has surpassed 30,000. The level of completions to date suggests we are on course to exceed the overall target of 29,000 new homes for 2023. Industry sources are also very positive about increased delivery continuing next year.

As Senators know, between 40% and 50% of the homes delivered this year will be backed directly by the Government through the various schemes we have. At the same time, nearly 24,000 homes commenced construction in the first three quarters of this year, up 14% on the same period last year. The reasons for this include the waiving of development levies and Uisce Éireann connection charges which were criticised by some, although not all, Opposition Members. Combined with the upward trend in the number of new residential planning permissions, this suggests that the recent substantial uplift in supply will be sustained into next year and beyond.

Last year saw the highest annual output of social housing in almost 50 years, with 10,263 new social homes delivered through local authorities and approved housing bodies through build, acquisitions or leasing. Just short of 7,500 of these are new-build homes. This has almost doubled new social homes and it is a testament to how Housing for All is having a tangible positive effect for tens of thousands of the most vulnerable in this country, including our homeless community.

I fully recognise the scale of the challenge of homelessness and the need to tackle social housing waiting lists. We have significantly increased the numbers of people prevented from entering emergency accommodation and exits from emergency accommodation are also increasing. However, we know more needs to be done. Key to addressing this is to give those who are in emergency accommodation a safe and secure home through delivering increased supply.

Housing for All will deliver 90,000 new social homes between now and 2030, with more than 54,000 affordable homes.As I am standing here speaking to Senators, approximately 22,600 social homes are either on-site or at various stages of design and procurement. Increasing the level of homeownership is one of the key pillars of our plan. Providing affordable homes for our people is one of the Government's top priorities. More than €760 million in direct affordability and homeownership funding for next year, 2024, has been allocated and that will support affordability initiatives that we put in place.

The first home scheme, which was launched in July 2022, just over a year ago, will support at least 8,000 affordable house purchases over the lifetime of the scheme. Since its introduction, just short of 7,000 people and families have registered their details with the scheme. Really importantly, just short of 3,000 households have been approved, are eligible and are buying their homes through the first home shared equity scheme. The first home scheme has been extended to include those who are building their own homes, and we have already seen double-digit approvals in this space. This shows the Government’s commitment to increasing homeownership. Homeownership is a just and honest aspiration for people and households to have and it is something that should be supported.

The local authority home loans have also been enhanced - and we can do more in that space - to make it easier, particularly for single people, to get mortgages. The scheme supports first-time buyers and low and moderate incomes who are unable to secure mortgages. More than 600 home loans were drawn down last year.

Affordable purchase schemes are coming on stream right across the local authority sector. More than €350 million has been approved under the affordable housing fund. So far, we have 67 projects over 20 local authorities which will deliver more than 4,000 affordable homes to purchase through our local authorities. That is being added to every week. Last week, I approved an additional €82 million for 500 extra houses. I will have more announcements next week.

The help-to-buy scheme has been extended. I welcome that the Government has made that decision. It has been expanded to the €30,000 rate so people can get their own tax back into their pockets to help them buy their own homes, to the end of 2025. Some 42,200 people have benefited from the scheme. We are committed to keeping it in place where others would scrap it.

Housing for All is also focused on tackling supply and affordability issues in the rental market. We are targeting 18,000 cost-rental homes between the period from now to 2030 through local authorities, approved housing and the Land Development Agency, LDA. Now, private providers are able to access cost-rental homes through the secure tenancy affordable scheme. We have approved more than 1,000 tenancies. Next week we will make some significant announcements on very sizable schemes relating to cost-rental homes.

We are also completing a comprehensive review of the private rental sector. That needs to happen in order to take into account the significant regulatory changes that have taken place in the past few years. We are exploring every opportunity to add supply to the rental sector. We need homes in the rental sector as well. Really importantly, we have extended and increased the rent tax credit for next year to €750 per renter. That is a significant assistance to renters. It is cash back in their pockets to defray the cost of rent.

On vacancy and the vacant homes refurbishment grant, or the Croí Cónaithe grant, there have been more than 4,500 applications to date. In every town, village and city, we are seeing increased applications. There is up to €70,000 to help defray the cost of taking those homes back into use. We have had more than 2,000 approvals to date. These are 2,000 vacant homes that have been brought back into use. Rightly, we are supporting people to do that.

In May, we launched our residential construction cost study, which is a timely report that prioritises action to deliver economically sustainable housing in the long term through productivity, cost reduction and innovation. A big part of innovation is the delivery of homes through modern methods of construction, MMC, and off-site construction. We have targeted, with the local authorities, an additional 1,500 social homes through sites where we have taken the debt from the local authorities on the basis that they will deliver those homes through the use of modern methods of construction, MMC. Approximately 48% of the homes in the country are delivered on the basis of timber frame and MMC. The State lags behind that at approximately 24% or 25%. We want to push that up. It is a better way of producing homes.

We have to create the environment to enable the supply of more than 300,000 new homes. That is why it is crucially important that the new planning and development Bill 2023, which was approved by the Cabinet on 3 October, is passed by this House and the Dáil. It is the most comprehensive review of planning legislation that has ever been undertaken. It is the third-largest Bill that has been produced since the foundation of the State. It is urgent, it is radical and it is needed. We need up-to-date legislation that underpins a streamlined, modern planning system.With that, it is necessary to ensure that we have the resources in our planning system. There are more than 300 posts in total approved with An Bord Pleanála and 15 board members now in place where we were as low as five last year with all the difficulties that An Bord Pleanála has.

If I could use the opportunity here in the Seanad, I know that many Senators, like me, will have been alarmed by the report in today's Irish Independentin respect of alleged attempts to exploit the planning appeals process, to extort money from home builders. As we all know, any private profiteering at the expense of people struggling to get a home is simply not acceptable. The price for such alleged actions is ultimately paid by the first-time buyers themselves, forced to meet higher costs, and by communities that need more homes and are hit by delays in the appeals system. It is deeply unfair on people who are trying to start out in life by getting their first home. I have received assurances from the Attorney General that matters such as those that were reported today are provided for under current law, notably section 17 of the Criminal Justice (Public Order) Act which states: "It shall be an offence for any person who, with a view to gain for himself or another or with intent to cause loss to another, makes any unwarranted demand with menaces." The Attorney General also advises that sections 6 and 7 of the Criminal Justice (Theft and Fraud Offences) Act may apply in instances such as those. I would urge anyone who has been subjected to or has knowledge of such fraudulent actions to contact the Garda. It is simply not acceptable that people will extort money in this way.

To achieve our goals, we must remain agile. The second annual update of the Housing for All action plan will be published early next week. The update is an opportunity to re-engage the whole of government in the process and to ensure the plan is focused on actions which activate and accelerate housing. In short, progress is being made. By any fair observation and estimation, one can see that house completions and commencements are increasing and increasing substantially. First-time buyers are up to the highest levels they have seen since 2006 or 2007. We delivered more new social homes last year than we have done since 1975 and we will do more this year as we move on with new forms of tenure like cost rental. I welcome the opportunity to address the Seanad this afternoon and present progress on Housing for All. I look forward to the Senators' contributions and input into this.