Michael McGrath (Cork South Central, Fianna Fail)
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711. To ask the Minister for Housing, Planning, and Local Government the number of public housing units built by local authorities and approved housing bodies since the foundation of the State; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [10345/20]

Eoghan Murphy (Dublin Bay South, Fine Gael)
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There is no single, comparable set of data pertaining to the output of public housing in the State which spans the near century covered by the Deputy's query.

The Central Statistics Office does hold records pertaining to housing units 'rented from Local Authority', which span back to prior to the formation of the State but even in the early decades of the State some of the these homes were supplied through the purchase of homes rather than new build so it is not possible to isolate the number built from the number delivered.

Some of this data from the early decades of the State may be accessed at the following link:

Since the outset of the Rebuilding Ireland Action Plan we have sought to make an unprecedented volume of data publicly and transparently available. To this end, quarterly monitoring across the various output streams are published to the both my Department's website and to the Open Data Portal in searchable and configurable formats.

Furthermore, a quarterly Social Housing Construction Status Report outlines an Appendix of every scheme completed and in progress, broken down by both Local Authority Area and by funding programme.

Q4 Social Housing Construction Status Report:

Social Housing Delivery (c.2000 onwards)

Open Data Portal (configurable files)

Cian O'Callaghan (Dublin Bay North, Social Democrats)
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713. To ask the Minister for Housing, Planning, and Local Government the number of houses approved for construction under the strategic housing development scheme; the number of houses approved that have been constructed; the number under construction; the number yet to begin construction; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [10378/20]

Eoghan Murphy (Dublin Bay South, Fine Gael)
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Under the Government's Rebuilding Ireland Action Plan on Housing and Homelessness, the Planning and Development (Housing) and Residential Tenancies Act 2016 (the Act) introduced new streamlined arrangements to enable planning applications for strategic housing developments (SHDs) of 100 housing units or more, or student accommodation or shared accommodation developments of 200 bed spaces or more, to be made directly to An Bord Pleanála (the Board) for determination.

The Board has received 204 SHD applications up to the 30 April 2020, in respect of a total of 57,332 homes (comprising 16,322 houses, 33,855 apartments and 7,155 Build to Rent homes), 12,022 student bed spaces and 600 shared accommodation bed spaces. The Board has granted permission on 132 SHD applications in respect of a total of 35,871 homes (comprising 9,583 houses, 20,962 apartments and 5,454 Build to Rent homes), 9,498 student bed spaces and 410 shared accommodation bed spaces. With regard to the other 72 applications; 36 were refused, 1 was referred back to the Board following judicial review, 1 was withdrawn, with the remainder still awaiting a decision.

Of the applications that were granted permission under the SHD arrangements, it is understood that commencement notices have been lodged in respect of 38 of these projects to date. A total of 9,553 homes were permitted in the developments in respect of which commencement notices have been lodged (comprising 4,262 houses, 5,002 apartments and 289 Build to Rent homes), as well as 5371 student bed spaces.

The recent review of the Strategic Housing Development arrangements highlighted that while they have generally been a success in providing a fast-track development consent process for developers of large-scale housing developments, the number of SHD permissions that have commenced development is less than might have been expected. Having reflected on the views of the Review Group on the rate of activation of SHD sites, it is considered appropriate that developers should be sufficiently motivated to commence development on foot of an SHD permission in a timely manner, given the efficiencies that the SHD arrangements provide.

Therefore, I indicated that I considered that it would be appropriate to introduce a "use it or lose it" measure requiring developers to have commenced a certain level of development within a certain period of time on foot of a grant of an SHD planning permission. My Department has been developing proposals in this regard, the further advancement of which will be considered in context of the legislative programme of the incoming Government.