HOUSING MINISTER JAMES Browne says he has spoken to his department’s top civil servant over comments he made about Ireland not needing a housing tsar. 

The Business Post reported that Graham Doyle, the secretary general of the Department of Housing, said a tsar wasn’t needed to solve blockages when it comes to delivering houses.

He made the remarks at a housing event organised by Property Industry Ireland (PII), an Ibec lobby group.

Doyle told those at the event that an “interventionist approach” was needed on the ground, at site level and said: “We never, ever used the word tsar”.

The term ‘housing tsar’ has been the informal name used to refer to the head of the Government’s proposed Housing Activation Office. 

According to the Business Post, attendees at the event were asked to do a public vote on whether Ireland needs a housing tsar. Doyle said: “I voted no”.  

‘He’s fully supportive’

Asked for his response this morning, the housing minister said he had spoken to the secretary general about his comments, stating that it is his understanding Doyle is fully supportive of the creation of housing activation office and having a CEO role.

“I think what he got into yesterday was almost a semantics debate about the description of the role and what it should be called, but he’s fully supportive of it. I’ve spoken with him since, and his support is very much there,” said Browne.

“It is the government the makes the decisions”, said the minister, who added that he will driving on with key decisions when it comes to housing policy changes.

The Housing Activation office is one of those, he told reporters today. 

The minister said it is “frustrating for myself” that there seems to be more debate about the title rather than the job that this person needs to do as housing tsar. 

“I’m very much focused on the Housing Activation [office], getting it up and running, getting that person in there as CEO, whatever anybody wants to call it. That’s a matter for them. I very much see it as a team leader on the ground,” he said. 

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While the minister said he is there to drive policy, he wants the housing activation unit to be “on the ground” to unlock sites.

Browne said he believed the government had good housing policies, but acknowledged misalignment in some areas, citing an example in Kildare where an affordable housing scheme is priced above the threshold of what the State deems affordable in its local authority home loan scheme.

In a statement, the Department of Housing said yesterday:

“With respect to the Secretary General Graham Doyle’s comments at today’s Property Industry Ireland conference, he took the opportunity to strongly emphasise that the word “tsar” is not – and was never – appropriate to describe the Housing Activation Office (HAO) CEO position and, indeed, was not coined by the Department or the Minister.

“Mr Doyle also emphasised, when called upon at the event this morning, that the HAO will have a CEO with an interventionist approach to key sites on the ground, not a “tsar” and the connotations that word evokes. The focus on ‘Tsar’ in past coverage has been misleading and not reflective of the real intent and purpose of the HAO role.

“The Secretary General is fully supportive of the HAO and wholly supportive of the Minister and what he is trying to achieve in this regard.”