Eoin Ó Broin (Dublin Mid West, Sinn Fein)
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683. To ask the Minister for Housing, Planning, and Local Government to provide a breakdown of the 1830 social housing acquisitions in 2023, by categories, vacant acquisitions, tenant-in-situ acquisitions, buy and renew acquisitions and mortgage-to-rent acquisitions; and to provide a breakdown of each category, by local authority. [14999/24]

Darragh O'Brien (Dublin Fingal, Fianna Fail)
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I propose to take Questions Nos. 683 and 705 together.

Under Housing for All, the Government will deliver 47,600 new build social homes and 3,500 social homes through long-term leasing in the period 2022-2026. Our clear focus is to increase the stock of social housing through new build projects delivered by local authorities and Approved Housing Bodies (AHBs).

Social Housing is delivered through a range of local authority and Approved Housing Body (AHB) delivery programmes across the build acquisition and lease delivery streams.

For 2023, the Government agreed that there would be increased provision for social housing acquisitions and my Department provided funding for local authorities to acquire at least 1,500 social homes. The additional acquisitions have primarily focused on properties where a tenant is in receipt of social housing supports and has received a Notice of Termination due to the landlord’s intention to sell the property. My Department issued a circular letter in March 2023, setting out details of these arrangements and each local authority was provided with a provisional allocation for social housing acquisitions in 2023.

For 2024, Government has again agreed to an increased provision to acquire 1,500 social homes with the primary focus on properties where a tenant is in receipt of social housing supports and has received a Notice of Termination due to the landlord’s intention to sell the property.

Local authorities have delegated sanction in relation to these acquisitions, subject to those acquisitions being within Acquisition Cost Guidelines (ACGs) issued by the Department. Local authorities regularly acquire properties that require repairs, however the cost of acquiring the property and relevant refurbishment costs must fall within the ACGs. An independent valuation must also be obtained for each acquisition, in line with established practice for local authorities for social housing acquisitions. The current Acquisition Cost Guidelines were updated and issued to local authorities in April 2023. These guidelines are reviewed and updated as appropriate by my Department usually on a periodic basis.

Local authorities will work with all social housing supported tenants who receive a Notice of Termination and offer the available supports, which may include a tenant in situ acquisition or support to obtain an alternative tenancy, including a HAP-supported tenancy or an allocation to local authority stock.

It is a matter for individual local authorities to identify suitable acquisitions in line with local circumstances and their social housing allocations policy. Local authorities take appropriate steps to ensure that their first response will be to support households to try to prevent homelessness in cases where tenants have been served with a notice of termination by their landlord. It is important to acknowledge that the Tenant in Situ scheme has been a key measure in preventing homelessness and as such has mitigated such impacts for many households in 2023.

My Department publishes comprehensive programme level statistics on a quarterly basis on social and affordable housing delivery activity by local authorities and Approved Housing Bodies (AHBs) in each local authority, including completed acquisitions. From 2023, this data includes a breakdown of acquisitions completed by each local authority where a Notice of Termination issued to a tenant and is available, for all local authorities, to the end of Quarter 4 2023 on the statistics page of my Department’s website at the following link: www.gov.ie/en/collection/6060e-overall-social-housing-provision/.

Eoin Ó Broin (Dublin Mid West, Sinn Fein)
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684. To ask the Minister for Housing, Planning, and Local Government to provide a breakdown of the 8110 social housing new builds delivered in 2023, by delivery streams, SHIP construction, SHIP turnkey, CALF construction, CALF turnkey, CAS construction, CAS turnkey, Local Authority Part V, Approved Housing Body Part V and regeneration and PPP. [15000/24]

Darragh O'Brien (Dublin Fingal, Fianna Fail)
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Housing for All is the Government’s plan to increase the supply of housing to an average of 33,000 per year over the next decade. This includes the delivery of 90,000 social homes, 36,000 affordable purchase homes and 18,000 cost rental homes. Housing for All is supported by an investment package of over €4bn per annum, through an overall combination of €12bn in direct Exchequer funding, €3.5bn in funding through the Land Development Agency and €5bn funding through the Housing Finance Agency.

My Department publishes comprehensive programme-level statistics on a quarterly basis on social housing delivery activity by local authorities and Approved Housing Bodies (AHBs) in each local authority. This data is available to the end of Q4 2023 and is published on the statistics' page of my Department’s website at the following link: gov.ie - Overall social and affordable housing provision (www.gov.ie)

My Department also publishes the Social Housing Construction Status Report (CSR). The CSR provides details of social housing developments and their location that have been completed, are under construction or are progressing through the various stages of the design and tender processes. The most recent publication was for Quarter 4 2023. All Construction Status Reports are available at the following link: www.gov.ie/en/collection/cb885-social-housing-construction-projects-status-reports/

A version of the CSR file can also be downloaded for analysis of completions, locations, approvals stage etc. at this link: Social Housing Construction Status Report Q4 2023 - Dataset - data.gov.ie.

A breakdown by the requested delivery streams for 2023 is set out in the table below: