John Curran (Dublin Mid West, Fianna Fail)
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239. To ask the Minister for Housing, Planning, Community and Local Government when the five units of accommodation being provided by an organisation (details supplied) at Station Road, Clondalkin, Dublin 22 will be ready for occupation; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [25777/17]

Simon Coveney (Cork South Central, Fine Gael)
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The units referred to have been part-funded by my Department through the Capital Advance Leasing Facility (CALF) which is available as a low interest loan provided by local authorities (and recouped by my Department) to Approved Housing Bodies (AHBs). This funding allows AHBs  access to early working capital (up to 30% of the relevant costs) for the purchase, construction or refurbishment of units which will then be made available for social housing purposes under the Social Housing Current Expenditure Programme (SHCEP). Low interest rate borrowings are available to AHBs from the Housing Finance Agency and other private finance streams to support the financing of the balance. The AHB effectively uses the CALF approval for the capital injection of up to 30% and the ongoing commitment of lease income under the Payment and Availability Agreement to leverage the balance finance required.

Once an AHB has secured the property and signed the Payment and Availability Agreement with the local authority, they use the lease income to service the borrowings.

Properties made available under the CALF scheme are used to accommodate households from the local authority waiting list. Leased properties are allocated to tenants, in accordance with the relevant local authority's allocation scheme.

The relevant AHB has confirmed that the contracts for the acquisition of these new build units have recently been signed and the transaction is due to close in the next few weeks. However, ahead of that, the AHB has already been engaging bilaterally with South Dublin County Council and commenced the appropriate  procedure to facilitate the most expeditious allocation of the dwellings, once the sale has closed.

Details in respect of the substantial pipeline of new social housing construction projects that is now in place are set out in the Status Report on Social Housing Construction Projects, the latest update of which I published recently and which is available at the following link: . Details of all the social housing construction projects being implemented across the 31 local authority areas are set out in the Report, including the number of new social homes covered by each separate project.

The Report covers over 600 projects, delivering over 10,000 new social homes, including some projects completed in 2016 and in the 1st quarter of this year, and others that are on site or at various stages of advancement through planning and design.