Ken O'Flynn (Cork North-Central, Independent Ireland Party)
Link to this: Individually | In context

376. To ask the Minister for Housing, Planning, and Local Government given the Summary Social Housing Assessment 2025 for Cork city, the current net need figure; the number of households who remain without social housing support; the steps he is taking to accelerate delivery in high-demand areas around Cork city, Glanmire, Blarney and Mallow. [49846/25]

James Browne (Wexford, Fianna Fail)
Link to this: Individually | In context

Details on the number of households qualified for social housing support in each local authority administrative area is provided in the annual statutory Summary of Social Housing Assessments (SSHA). The most recently published summary for all counties, conducted in November 2024, is available on my Department's website at www.gov.ie/en/collection/62486-summary-of-social-housing-assessments/

SSHA 2025 is currently underway and I expect to publish the summary report before the end of Q1 2026.

A number of initiatives have been introduced to support local authorities and Approved Housing Bodies increase the delivery of social housing.

A central element of Housing for All is to build institutional capacity. As part of the measures to support this, Housing for All commits to strengthen the capacity of local authorities to both programme manage and initiate, design, plan, develop and manage housing projects and recognises that this requires the resourcing of the housing services of local authorities. 11 additional posts in Cork City and 9 in Cork County have been approved to deliver social housing.

Modern Methods of Construction (MMC) has been identified as a key measure to address increased housing delivery and methods to support increased use of MMC are set out in Pathway 5 of Housing for All. In July 2023 the Roadmap for increased adoption of MMC in Public Housing delivery was published and sets out recommendations to progress the most advanced and efficient construction methods in the delivery of housing.

In December 2022, funding of €94m was provided to local authorities to address legacy land debts. The provision of this funding was linked to the immediate development of a housing proposal and a commitment to use Modern Methods of Construction (MMC). A total of 26 sites received funding as part of an accelerated delivery programme, and with some additional sites since added, my Department is overseeing a project to progress delivery of MMC projects on 36 sites which will deliver more than 1,500 new social homes across 13 local authorities. Cork City has one site in the programme which can deliver approximately 222 new homes while Cork County has 4 sites in the programme with the potential to deliver 71 homes.

The Housing for All Land Acquisition Fund was established in 2022 to support local authorities to acquire land to deliver new build social housing schemes and this was extended in 2024 to include land for affordable housing. The fund has an overall allocation of €239m and is managed by the Housing Agency.

My Department has embedded the requirement to adopt a standardised approach for all Social Housing projects through adoption of the Design Manual for Quality Housing and Employers Requirements. Standard internal layouts and CAD Drawings are available to design teams. This is promoting a consistent approach nationally; it is decreasing the amount of time spent on reviewing proposals to achieve value for money; it is shortening detailed design phases; and it allows for a more efficient tender process.

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. This data is available to the end of Q1 2025, and is published on the statistics page of my Department’s website, at the following link: www.gov.ie/en/collection/6060e-overall-social-housing-provision/. Data for Q2 2025 is currently being collated and will be published shortly.

My Department publishes the Social Housing Construction Status Report (CSR), which 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 1 2025. All CSRs 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 by local authority, location etc. at this link: opendata.housing.gov.ie/dataset/social-housing-construction-status-report-q1-2025.