Written answers
Thursday, 5 May 2016
Department of Environment, Community and Local Government
NAMA Social Housing Provision
Eoin Ó Broin (Dublin Mid West, Sinn Fein)
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125. To ask the Minister for Environment, Community and Local Government for a progress report on the National Asset Management Agency special purpose vehicle. detailed in the Social Housing Strategy 2020, including the names of the persons and organisations involved; the number of meetings held; the number of units produced via the special purpose vehicle; and the number of new tenancies created, since the special purpose vehicle was established. [9236/16]
Paudie Coffey (Waterford, Fine Gael)
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Following proactive engagement between NAMA, the Housing Agency and this Department, a process has been established since late 2011 to ascertain whether residential properties made available by NAMA, through its borrowers and receivers, are suitable for social housing. As a means of expediting the provision of social housing NAMA established a special purpose vehicle – National Asset Residential Property Services Ltd (NARPS). The purpose of this SPV is to acquire properties from developers or receivers in NAMA’s portfolio of loans and to make these available to local authorities and AHBs by way of a long term lease. In this way, a number of legal complexities around the securing of properties can be addressed and the process can move more quickly. A Steering Group was established comprising representatives of NAMA, the Housing Agency and my Department in order to work systematically through the units identified by NAMA, and to determine if there is a social housing demand for the properties. The Steering Group generally meets fortnightly and there have been approximately 100 meetings since 2012. Within this context, significant progress has been made in respect of delivery.
At the end of March 2016, a total of 2,042 residential properties have been delivered for social housing providers comprising of 1,469 completed properties with a further 573 that have been contracted where completion work is on-going. Of these 1,066 were contracted/delivered through the mechanism of NARPS. Full information including a breakdown by Local Authority is available on the website of the Housing Agency at /NAMA and also on the NAMA website .
Local Authorities, particularly those in high demand areas, are continually reviewing the list of available NAMA properties to see if they are suitable to be brought into use as social housing for people on local authority housing lists. The allocation and tenanting of social housing units is a matter for the relevant local authority, and my Department does not hold any records in this regard.
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