Eoin Ó Broin (Dublin Mid West, Sinn Fein)
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573. To ask the Minister for Housing, Planning, and Local Government the total drawdown of Local Infrastructure Housing Activation Fund funding in 2021, by project and amount. [1997/22]

Darragh O'Brien (Dublin Fingal, Fianna Fail)
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The objective of the Local Infrastructure Housing Activation Fund (LIHAF) is to provide public off-site infrastructure to relieve critical infrastructure blockages. This enables the accelerated delivery of housing on key development sites in Dublin and in urban areas of high demand. LIHAF is designed to specifically address the issue of housing supply, a crucial factor in terms of moderating house prices. Infrastructure being funded under LIHAF includes access roads, distributor roads, link roads, road improvements, roundabouts, bridges and parks.

In 2017, grant agreements for 30 approved projects were signed between my Department and local authorities. The total cost of these 30 projects is €200 million, of which €150 million will be funded by my Department and local authorities will fund €50 million.  The table below outlines the local authorities who drew down funds from the LIHAF in 2021 by project and amount.

Eoin Ó Broin (Dublin Mid West, Sinn Fein)
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574. To ask the Minister for Housing, Planning, and Local Government the number of requests from local authorities to acquire new land in 2021, by local authority in tabular form; the location of the land; and the amount of funding requested. [1998/22]

Darragh O'Brien (Dublin Fingal, Fianna Fail)
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Specific allocations of funding are not made to local authorities for land; they make their own decisions regarding land acquisition in line with their needs across a range of purposes and they do not present all proposals for the acquisition of new land in advance to my Department. 

When land is used for the construction of new social housing, my Department provides full funding in respect of the capital costs, including land costs and construction costs. 

However, to support local authorities in their delivery of social housing, a new initiative was implemented in 2021 to fund land acquisition where it's for new social housing developments. The focus with this initiative was for land that is development-ready for housing, is appropriately zoned, which faces no other known obstacles to its development and where the local authority can work to a delivery programme to develop social housing as soon as possible on the site.  In such cases, funding for the land was provided by my Department when a local authority presented a viable social housing development proposal for the site. 

The table below shows a breakdown of sites acquired by local authorities under this 2021 initiative. It is important to note that this is not reflective or inclusive of all sites that may have been acquired by local authorities during 2021 through the normal process, and these sites below are solely those acquired on foot of the Land Initiative circular introduced last year.  I look forward to the support of public representatives in the advancement of much needed new social homes on these sites.