Eoin Ó Broin (Dublin Mid West, Sinn Fein)
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145. To ask the Minister for Housing, Planning, Community and Local Government the persons and or the groups on the departmental working group on vacant properties; the number of times this working group has met; and when the the working group is going to report back. [3531/17]

Simon Coveney (Cork South Central, Fine Gael)
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Pillar 5 of the Government’s Action Plan for Housing and Homelessness – Rebuilding Irelandis specifically focussed on Utilising Existing Housing Stock, with a key objective of ensuring that the existing vacant housing stock throughout the country and across all forms of tenure, in both the public and private sectors, is used to the optimum degree possible. In this regard, Action 5.1 of Rebuilding Irelandcommits to developing a National Vacant Housing Re-Use Strategy by the first quarter of 2017, informed by Census 2016 data, to –

- inform the compilation of a register of vacant units across the country,

- identify the number, location and reasons for longer-term vacancies (i.e. over 6 months) in high demand areas, and

- set out a range of actions to bring vacant units back into reuse.

The Housing Agency, which has lead responsibility for co-ordinating the development of the Strategy, established a working group in September 2016 comprising senior representatives from my Department, local authorities, the Irish Council for Social Housing and from the Housing Agency itself to inform the Strategy. The Working Group is chaired by the Housing Agency.

The Working Group held its inaugural meeting on 30 September 2016 and has met three times since in October and November 2016, and most recently on 13 January 2017. It is due to report by the end of Q1 2017.