Mattie McGrath (Tipperary, Independent)
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454. To ask the Minister for Housing, Planning, Community and Local Government to set out in tabular form the amounts paid under the housing assistance payment scheme for each county in 2016; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [1156/17]

Simon Coveney (Cork South Central, Fine Gael)
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More than 16,500 households are currently having their housing needs met through the Housing Assistance Payment (HAP) scheme, which has now been rolled out to all categories of households in 28 local authority areas. The Dublin Region Homelessness Executive (DRHE) is also managing a HAP Homeless Pilot for the four Dublin local authorities. 12,075 HAP tenancies were set-up in 2016 meeting the scheme's Rebuilding Irelandtarget for the year. The national roll-out of HAP will be competed with the introduction of the scheme to Dublin City Council, Fingal County Council and Dun Laoghaire Rathdown County Council areas from 1 March, 2017.

The HAP scheme is funded through a combination of Exchequer monies and tenant differential rents collected in respect of HAP tenancies. The provisional exchequer outturn for the HAP scheme in 2016 was in excess of €57 million. The majority of this funding is to support the ongoing costs of tenancies established in 2015 that continued into 2016, and the costs of the 12,075 new households supported by the scheme in 2016. Budget 2017 has increased the Exchequer funding for the HAP scheme to €152.7 million, in order to meet the continuing costs of existing HAP households, and the costs of an additional 15,000 households to be supported by HAP in 2017.

A 2016 breakdown of HAP expenditure by local authority will be compiled and will be provided to the Deputy in accordance with Standing Orders.