Darragh O'Brien (Dublin Fingal, Fianna Fail)
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353. To ask the Minister for Housing, Planning, and Local Government the status of the Rebuilding Ireland commitment to bring forward pilot projects, beginning with Dublin City Council, based on best practice and cost effectiveness taking a cross-departmental inter-agency approach to housing initiatives for older persons. [48098/19]

Damien English (Meath West, Fine Gael)
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Action 2.16 of Rebuilding Ireland states that my Department will bring forward pilot projects, beginning with Dublin City Council, based on best practice and cost effectiveness taking a cross Departmental/inter-agency approach to housing initiatives for older people. 

The aim of this Action is to examine the potential for mainstreaming best practice projects, which bring together the HSE and local authorities with designers and academic groups.  Such models would cater for those who, while not requiring full nursing home care, have been assessed as having healthcare needs that can be met in the community.  

Work on this Action has been underway for some time now and a pathfinder project at St.Michael's Estsate, Inchicore, Dublin 8 will include 52 'living with support' homes for older people. The 'housing with support' model brings together a range of services and supports, principally relating to housing, community, social and care needs. It seeks to provide an appropriate physical and supportive environment that enables older persons to live in their own homes within their own community, thereby both promoting independence and reducing or deferring the need to move into long term residential care.

The project is underpinned by a cross-Departmental inter-agency approach and involves cooperation between my Department, the Housing Agency, Dublin City Council, HSE, the Irish Council for Social Housing (ICSH), Circle VHA and Alone.

This pilot project has been approved for funding through my Department's Capital Assistance Scheme and is currently at planning permission stage, with construction likely to commence in or around Summer 2020.

In tandem with the work on the St. Michael’s project, housing initiatives for older people are also a focus of the policy statement ‘Housing Options for our Ageing Population’ which was jointly published by my Department and the Department of Health. An Implementation group, which includes a range of stakeholders, has been put in place to work on the Actions under the Statement and will be reporting to myself and to my colleague, Minister Daly, Minister of State for Mental Health and Older People.

Darragh O'Brien (Dublin Fingal, Fianna Fail)
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354. To ask the Minister for Housing, Planning, and Local Government the status of the Rebuilding Ireland commitment to create pilot competitions, focusing on three distinct areas of smart technologies in housing for older persons, adaptation of existing houses to meet the needs of older persons and life-time communities; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [48099/19]

Damien English (Meath West, Fine Gael)
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In January 2017, I launched the Rebuilding Ireland Homes for Smart Ageing Universal Design Challenge. The Homes for Smart Ageing Universal Design Challenge was an initiative under the Rebuilding Ireland programme (Action 2.19) and the Programme of Actions for Smart Ageing, which aims to stimulate and encourage the design and construction industries to be innovative in designing and delivering housing solutions for older people. The total Design Challenge prize fund of €100,000 was funded by my Department and project managed by the Centre for Excellence in Universal Design.

Over 60 high-quality entries were received from around the country, with five commended entries reaching the final round where they received funding of €10,000 and support to develop their idea further. In June 2017, I announced the winner of the Homes for Smart Ageing Universal Design Challenge during an award ceremony at Dublin Castle. The winner, who received €50,000, was The Abhaile Project.

The Abhaile Project developed an innovative new model to support older homeowners to reconfigure their family-sized homes by creating an independent living area suitable for the older homeowner, eliminating the need to use the stairs; and creating an affordable one-bedroomed rental accommodation upstairs. Using a Universal Design approach, this promotes an efficient way to use our existing housing stock by carving much needed new one-bedroomed rental capacity from existing housing stock in mature urban areas, allowing the homeowner to live securely and independently downstairs, whilst promoting interaction with the person living upstairs, thereby reducing isolation.