Richard Boyd Barrett (Dún Laoghaire, People Before Profit Alliance)
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1188. To ask the Minister for Housing, Planning, and Local Government his plans to introduce affordable housing schemes in 2019; when and the locations in which they will be available; the persons who will qualify; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [1625/19]

Eoghan Murphy (Dublin Bay South, Fine Gael)
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A multi-stranded approach is being taken to the targeted delivery of affordable housing. In particular, for those households earning annual gross incomes up to €50,000 for single applicants and €75,000 for dual applicants.

In terms of affordable purchase, I commenced the relevant provisions of Part 5 of the Housing (Miscellaneous Provisions) Act 2009 on 18 June 2018, to provide a statutory basis for the delivery of affordable housing for purchase. Part 5 contains significant detail on the procedures and operation of the new Affordable Purchase Scheme. The primary legislation will be supported by associated regulations, which are currently being finalised, following extensive consultation between my Department, the Housing Agency and local authorities. The regulations, once finalised, together with guidance, will issue to local authorities.

In order to support the affordable housing programmes of local authorities, the Government has committed €310 million, over the three years 2019 to 2021, under the Serviced Sites Fund (SSF) announced as part of Budget 2019. The funding is available for key facilitating infrastructure, on public lands, to support the provision of affordable homes to purchase or rent. I envisage a maximum amount of SSF funding of €50,000 per affordable home and on this basis at least 6,200 affordable homes could be facilitated.

On 11 December 2018, I issued approval in principle for ten infrastructure projects across five local authority areas, in Dublin and Cork, under the first SSF call for proposals. This first tranche of funding of €43 million will enable the delivery of 1,400 affordable homes on local authority lands. I expect infrastructure works on these projects to begin as soon as possible and delivery of affordable homes from early 2020 onwards. Details of these projects are set out in the table below. There are five further projects under active consideration by my Department, with the potential to facilitate the delivery of an additional 230 affordable homes.

More broadly, all local authorities have been asked to carry out economic assessments of the requirement for affordable housing in their areas and the viability to deliver such affordable housing from their sites. A second call for proposals under the Fund will be made shortly. The scope of that call will be influenced by the information received from local authorities, as part of the aforementioned assessments, which are currently being examined in my Department.

The Government is also committed to the introduction of a not-for-profit, cost rental sector in Ireland. Together with delivering more affordable and predictable rents, cost rental will make a sustainable impact on national competitiveness and the attractiveness of our main urban centres as places to live and work. Like affordable purchase, cost rental homes will be targeted at households earning incomes up to a maximum of €50,000 for single applicants and €75,000 for dual applicants.

As cost rental is a new housing model to Ireland and in order to drive delivery, a number of important early mover projects are being advanced, delivering important lessons in terms of cost rental in an Irish setting. These cost rental pilot schemes are at Enniskerry Road, in Dún Laoghaire-Rathdown, and Emmet Road in Inchicore, respectively.

It is expected that 50 cost rental units and 105 social homes will be made available on the Enniskerry Road site. The tenders for the project are currently being assessed, and it is anticipated that construction will commence later in the first quarter of 2019.

Dublin City Council has appointed a dedicated project manager and a project team to drive the Emmet Road project forward. While the final tenure-mix on the site will be decided by the Council, informed by the detailed site development process, it will likely include 140 social housing homes, with the remaining 330 homes predominantly provided under cost rental arrangements.

These initiatives complement other Government actions which help first-time buyers to buy a home, such as the Help to Buy Scheme and the Rebuilding Ireland Home Loan.

Table: List of projects that have received approval in principle under the SSF first call for proposals