Niamh Smyth (Cavan-Monaghan, Fianna Fail)
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222. To ask the Minister for Housing, Planning, Community and Local Government the timeframe for maintenance to be carried out on housing for tenants already living in social housing; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [9319/17]

Simon Coveney (Cork South Central, Fine Gael)
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The management and maintenance of local authority housing stock, including the implementation of planned maintenance programmes and carrying out of responsive repairs to tenants already living in social housing and pre-letting repairs to vacant properties, is a matter for each individual local authority under section 58 of the Housing Act, 1966. In line with commitments in Rebuilding Ireland, An Action Plan for Housing and Homelessness, my Department is working with local authorities on a strategy that will see all local authorities operating to a national re-letting performance standard and using a preventative maintenance approach to housing stock management.

In addition, in order to ensure the fullest use of local authority social housing stock, the Voids programme was introduced in 2014, followed by the Derelicts programme in 2016, and collectively, these two programmes have seen the remediation of approximately 7,200 units between 2014 and 2016.

These programmes have provided funding to support the authorities in tackling those houses that may require a greater level of remediation than the normal level of pre-letting repairs that is the responsibility of local authorities as part of their on-going repair and maintenance of local authority housing and, without the funding, would most likely have remained vacant. Instead these units were brought back into productive use and made available for re-letting.