Richard Boyd Barrett (Dún Laoghaire, People Before Profit Alliance)
Link to this: Individually | In context | Oireachtas source

21. To ask the Minister for Housing, Planning, and Local Government the criteria he plans to establish regarding affordability in local infrastructure housing activation fund, LIHAF, funded developments and on publicly owned land; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [52267/17]

Eoghan Murphy (Dublin Bay South, Fine Gael)
Link to this: Individually | In context | Oireachtas source

The Government acknowledges the affordability pressures faced by households with low to moderate incomes, particularly in parts of the country where the demand-supply imbalance is resulting in increasing house prices and rent inflation. It is precisely for that reason that Rebuilding Ireland has prioritised the supply of new homes to meet current and pent-up demand as well as helping to moderate house prices and rents.

A range of measures has been taken to address this, for example, in relation to planning reforms to provide flexibility and certainty in delivering viable housing schemes and apartment developments in the right locations, the introduction of Rent Pressure Zones, and the establishment of the Local Infrastructure Housing Activation Fund (LIHAF), to deliver new homes that are more viable and more affordable than would otherwise be the case.

The primary objective of LIHAF is to stimulate and accelerate the early release of land for housing in urban areas with large demand, by opening up these lands with key enabling public infrastructure that would otherwise not be provided in the short term. The resulting increase in the supply of new houses on both private and public lands is key to tackling price and affordability, as lack of supply is one of the main factors currently inflating house prices.

As required under the LIHAF scheme's criteria and conditions, local authorities were asked, inter alia, to obtain commitments from housing providers on associated sites in relation to housing delivery timelines and cost reductions.  The objective of securing cost reductions is to make the housing more affordable than would otherwise be the case and the level of the reduction is proportionate to the scale of the LIHAF investment in the enabling infrastructure for each project.  In many of the projects, local authorities will aggregate LIHAF deductions to provide more affordable housing, under qualifying criteria to be set in line with the forthcoming national policy on affordability.  Of course, there will also be a social housing dividend from all of the LIHAF sites, together with additional social and affordable housing to be provided on the State-owned sites.

As part of Budget 2018, I announced an additional €50 million funding which will be available for a second LIHAF call and which will again be subject to matching funding of 25% by local authorities. This will facilitate the provision of more public infrastructure to unlock further sites and activate more housing supply. A further call for proposals under LIHAF is likely early in 2018.

As regards the use of publicly owned land for the delivery of homes, it is crucial that the State's housing land bank is developed as soon as possible. To this end, details of some 1,700 hectares of land in local authority and Housing Agency ownership were published on the Rebuilding Ireland Housing Land Map, with these lands having the potential to deliver some 42,500 homes nationally. The map also includes details of some 300 hectares of land in ownership of other State or semi-State bodies, with the potential to deliver a further 7,500 homes. All of the mapped sites can be viewed at the following link:

. 

Two major sites in Dublin at Kilcarberry near Clondalkin and O'Devaney Gardens off Infirmary Road in the city centre, encompassing the construction of some 1,500 new homes, are already well advanced through the procurement process.

Recognising the need for more affordable housing, as an immediate additional measure, I am providing funding of €25 million, over 2018 and 2019, to unlock local authority-owned lands specifically for affordable housing, using delivery models like co-operative housing which have already proven to be successful but are now needed at scale.  My Department is currently finalising the arrangements for the use of this funding and I expect to announce details in this regard shortly. It is estimated that over 650 new affordable homes could be facilitated under this Scheme.

In the context of his new role in driving and co-ordinating housing delivery, my colleague Minister of State Damien English will chair the State Land Management Group which will reconvene early in the New Year to, inter alia, oversee delivery of housing from the State land bank.  In this regard, my Department will also continue to engage with other Government Departments and State and semi-State bodies to pursue the long-term optimal use of appropriate sites for residential purposes.