Written answers

Thursday, 6 April 2017

Department of Housing, Planning, Community and Local Government

Housing Policy

Photo of Eoin Ó BroinEoin Ó Broin (Dublin Mid West, Sinn Fein)
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20. To ask the Minister for Housing, Planning, Community and Local Government in view of the fact that his Department’s three schemes aimed at bringing vacant homes back into use only targets 3% of the total vacant housing stock and in view of the fact that his Department is currently developing a strategy to target these units if this strategy will contain a commitment to significantly increase the resourcing of this scheme to ensure a greater number of vacant homes are brought on stream. [17089/17]

Photo of Simon CoveneySimon Coveney (Cork South Central, Fine Gael)
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The three schemes to which I presume the Deputy is referring are those already launched under Pillar 5 of the Rebuilding Ireland Action Plan for Housing and Homelessness aimed at facilitating the re-use of existing housing stock; namely:-

- the Repair and Leasing Scheme, providing funding to the owners of vacant properties for their refurbishment and subsequent long-term leasing to local authorities for social housing purposes, with €140m funding being provided over the next 5 years aimed at securing 3,500 units for social housing,

- the Buy and Renew Scheme, facilitating local authorities to purchase and renew housing units in need of remediation and make them available for social housing use, with an initial budget of €25m for 2017, and

- the purchase by the Housing Agency of vacant properties on the portfolios of financial institutions, for social housing use, in respect of which a rolling fund of €70m is being provided.

The significant levels of funding being provided for these schemes reflect the priority attached by the Government to getting vacant properties back into use, particularly for social housing purposes.

As I have indicated, Pillar 5 of Rebuilding Ireland is specifically focused on 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 commits to the development of a National Vacant Housing Re-Use Strategy, 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 re-use.

To this end, the Housing Agency, which has lead responsibility for coordinating the development of the Strategy, established a working group in September 2016, comprising senior representatives from my Department, local authorities and from the Housing Agency itself to inform the Strategy. The Working Group is presently concluding its deliberations on recommendations to be incorporated in the Strategy, with a view to facilitating and incentivising the greater re-utilisation of vacant properties. It is expected that the Strategy will be published next month. 

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