Barry Cowen (Laois-Offaly, Fianna Fail)
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555. To ask the Minister for Environment, Community and Local Government if he will provide in tabular form on a county basis the total per annum interest payment due under the land aggregation scheme in 2015. [46289/14]

Barry Cowen (Laois-Offaly, Fianna Fail)
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556. To ask the Minister for Environment, Community and Local Government if he will provide in tabular form on a county basis the total value of land accumulated under the land aggregation scheme in 2015. [46290/14]

Alan Kelly (Tipperary North, Labour)
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I propose to take Questions Nos. 555 and 556 together.

The Land Aggregation Scheme (LAGS) was introduced in 2010 as part of revised arrangements for the funding of land for social housing purposes. The primary purpose of the Scheme was to assist in the unwinding of loans taken out by housing authorities to purchase land for the social and affordable housing investment programme. As such the relevant valuation for the purpose of the scheme is the value of the loans involved and, in that regard, applications to the value of some €163 million in loans were accepted into the Land Aggregation Scheme.

The figure of €163 m includes €111 m in respect of loans which were, under the first phase of the scheme, fully redeemed by local authorities with funding recouped from my Department, under the original terms of the Scheme. There are no interest payments due on these loans. The remaining €52 m accepted into the Scheme under its second phase is in the form of annuity loans, for which local authorities are making repayments to the Housing Finance Agency. Local authorities may recoup the capital and interest payments from my Department on condition that related LAGS lands have transferred to the Housing Agency. To date, nine of the 26 sites accepted following the introduction of the second iteration of the Scheme have transferred to the Agency. Once all accepted land in LAGS is transferred to the ownership of the Housing Agency it is estimated that the local authorities involved will be eligible to claim recoupment in full in the order of an estimated €2.68 million a year, based on current interest rates.

The table provides a County breakdown in relation to the loans accepted into LAGS under the second Iteration of the scheme.

*ANNUITY LAND ACQUISITION LOANS TRANSFERRED TO LAGS