Jackie Cahill (Tipperary, Fianna Fail)
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170. To ask the Minister for Environment, Community and Local Government if the €451 million capital funding for building social houses that has been set aside for 2016, will be spent; if there are any difficulties anticipated in this regard by the local authorities; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [12034/16]

Jackie Cahill (Tipperary, Fianna Fail)
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171. To ask the Minister for Environment, Community and Local Government if he will provide a progress report on the €1.7 billion capital funding that was set aside in 2015 to provide for the provision of social housing from 2015 to 2017; if there are any difficulties with the local authorities using this funding within the prescribed period; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [12035/16]

Simon Coveney (Cork South Central, Fine Gael)
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I propose to take Questions Nos. 170 and 171 together.

An exchequer capital budget of €451 million is provided for the delivery of social housing programmes in 2016. This exchequer budget will be supplemented by capital expenditure of €77 million on housing programmes which local authorities will self-fund from Local Property Tax receipts, giving a total capital budget for 2016 of €528 million. In overall terms, €933 million - being €528 million capital and €405 million current funding - is budgeted for social housing programmes in 2016.

This funding will support the targeting of 17,000 new social units through a range of delivery programmes in 2016. The capital programmes will support a combination of construction projects that are being advanced, acquisition of units which are being actively pursued for quick delivery of social housing and returning vacant social units to productive use. This funding also provides other important improvements to existing social housing stock through programmes such as regeneration, adaptation grants for people with a disability and the elderly, and energy efficiency upgrades to homes.

As well as supporting the targeting of 17,000 new social units in 2016, the funding through the Social Housing Strategy 2020 of €1.7 billion under budgets 2015 (€798m) and 2016 (€933m) has already provided for the delivery of 13,000 social housing units in 2015 by local authorities and approved housing bodies. This represented an increase of 86% on the 7,000 units delivered in 2014.

The scale of new social housing activity now underway represents a challenge for all concerned following from a number of years where funding was not available to support large scale capital activity. To support the delivery of the targets under the Social Housing Strategy, my Department has sanctioned 420 additional staff for local authorities and a substantial number of new social housing projects have already been announced, details of which are available on my Department’s website at the following links:

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With these projects now approved and with additional resources in place, I have asked local authority chief executives to ensure that the funding to support the enhanced delivery of social housing is maximised to deliver on the targets for 2016 and subsequent years.