Catherine Connolly (Galway West, Independent)
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247. To ask the Minister for Environment, Community and Local Government the funds provided to Galway City Council and Galway County Council for the construction and purchase of social housing; the funds returned and unused by each council, and the number of social houses built and purchased in each of the years 2011 to 2016 to date, in tabular form; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [11692/16]

Simon Coveney (Cork South Central, Fine Gael)
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From 2011 to date, my Department has provided €6.8 million to Galway City Council and €13 million to Galway County Council to support them in the delivery of their local authority housing construction and acquisition programmes. As funding provided is based on costs incurred by local authorities, a situation does not arise where funding is returned to my Department unspent.

Arising from the Social Housing Strategy, targets and provisional funding allocation have been notified to each local authority, including Galway City and Galway County Councils. These are available on my Department’s website at the following link: .

The Galway authorities have a combined target of 1,126 social housing units for the period out to 2017, supported by an allocation of €58.5m, to be invested in a combination of building, buying and leasing schemes.

Following the notification of targets, approvals for a substantial number of new social housing projects were announced in May 2015, July 2015 and January 2016. Between these three announcements, almost €680 million has been allocated for over 3,900 social housing new builds, turnkey developments and acquisitions. This included over 270 units, supported by investment of some €45 million in respect of the Galway authorities. I am keen that all local authorities advance these projects as soon as possible and I have assured them that funding is available to fully support their efforts in this regard. Details of these project approvals are available on my Department’s website at the following links:

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Information on social housing units constructed and acquired in respect of all local authorities and approved housing bodies and funded by direct capital investment by my Department, is published on my Department’s website at the following link:.

As well as construction projects, local authorities have also been advised by my Department to be ambitious in the acquisition of social housing this year and have been assured that funding is available to meet that ambition.