John Cummins (Waterford, Fine Gael)

I thank Senator Boyhan for raising what is an important matter. The programme for Government, as he rightly pointed out, commits to introducing a new programme to support the effective and speedy turnaround of vacated local authority social homes. My Department has been working on this matter and I expect a new programme that will further support the transition to a planned maintenance approach and the quicker turnaround of casual vacancies, to be rolled out early in the new year.

The new programme will build on the strong progress made in tackling local authority vacancy levels. This was supported and enabled by significant Exchequer funding in the past ten years, particularly since 2020. More than €360 million has been provided to local authorities since 2014, supporting the refurbishment and re-letting of some 26,000 social homes. This year alone, some €31 million was provided, targeting the turnaround of 1,900 social homes.

The programme focuses on the prompt turnaround and re-letting of vacant homes.It supports only those works necessary to comply with the housing standards for rented houses guidelines 2019. Non-essential works are not supported and should be carried out under the local authority's own planned maintenance programme, informed by stock condition surveys where all housing components are on an inspection, repair and replacement cycle. Local authority officials and elected members must ensure there is adequate funding provision for repairs and cyclical maintenance, using the significant rental income available to them, as part of their annual budgetary process. There is no upper cap on the amount that can be spent per home, providing the total amount averaged across all homes submitted by local authorities does not exceed €11,000. Where a local authority chooses to do works over and above those that are necessary to comply with statutory rental standards, it invariably impacts relay times and increases costs for the local authority. At a time of such need, this approach must be interrogated by local authority members.

In my work as Minister of State with responsibility for planning and local government, this is an area on which I place significant focus. Being frank, there are unacceptable discrepancies in local authority performance in this area. I have had some frank and honest conversations with executive teams in local authorities around the country. The NOAC performance indicators report for 2024 bears out this fact. It simply should not be the case that local authorities in Roscommon, Monaghan and Carlow are able to re-let local authority homes in under 16 weeks while local authorities such as those in Limerick, Kerry and Louth take over a year. The average re-letting time now stands at 35 weeks nationally and I am sure the Senator agrees that this must reduce. Every local authority has a responsibility in this area.

The funding that has been provided in the past decade or so has tackled a large number of long-term vacant stock and brought those properties back into use, paving the way for the transition to a more appropriate approach to housing maintenance, which is the planned maintenance approach the Senator referenced. Some €10 million has been ring-fenced for local authorities to commence and continue this transition from a largely response and voids-based approach to a planned maintenance approach based on planned work programmes informed by stock condition surveys. Given the significant level of funding over recent years, the vast majority of legacy vacancy issues should be addressed at this stage. Accordingly, local authorities should be better positioned to address casual vacancies and further transition to that planned approach to housing maintenance. We will continue to support local authorities in those endeavours in the time ahead.