James Geoghegan (Dublin Bay South, Fine Gael)
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507. To ask the Minister for Housing, Planning, and Local Government if he will direct the Land Development Agency to provide an update in respect of their interest or engagement with the HSE concerning the sale of a property (details supplied); and its potential use as LDA housing; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [65195/25]

James Browne (Wexford, Fianna Fail)
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Government is strongly committed to the use of vacant or underutilised state land for housing, having agreed the transfer to date of 37 sites to the Land Development Agency (LDA) to develop social and affordable housing.

Policies and requirements relating to the management and disposal of State Property assets which are surplus to requirements have been put in place by the Department of Public Expenditure, Infrastructure, Public Service Reform, and Digitalisation. All State bodies who require land, and have an interest in their acquisition, review the State Property register to determine if property is available that is suitable for their needs.

Furthermore, following Housing for All, all Government Departments agreed to examine existing portfolios of properties to determine their suitability for residential housing and the Local Government Management Agency conducted an in-depth review of sites identified. Baggot Street hospital was placed by the HSE on the State Property Register with an indication that it was available.

On foot of this, the Adaptive Reuse Division of Dublin City Council conducted a site investigation, and preliminary costings found that the building was not habitable and the work required to bring it into a habitable condition would require substantial time and money.

Separately, the Land Development Agency (LDA) was recently offered the building/site for sale in line with the statutory requirement under Section 53 of the LDA Act ("the Act"), which is to ensure that any relevant public land being disposed of is assessed to see if it is fit for use for the purposes of the Act, primarily the provision of affordable and social housing.

The LDA has declined to acquire it, noting that the property will still be subject to the affordable housing requirements under Part 9 of the Act if it is later developed for housing i.e. 100% of any housing developed must be for social and affordable housing purposes.

In general, the adaptive reuse of historic hospital buildings, often with preservation orders in place, has proved unviable to date given the high costs of refurbishment and reconfiguration that would be required. It is important to note that the level of funding that would be required to make the buildings useable could be better deployed to make more housing or accommodation beds available more quickly.