LOCAL AUTHORITIES THAT can build rapid build homes next year on sites it is carrying debt on will be assisted through a €100 million fund put forward by Government. 

Housing Minister Darragh O’Brien got Cabinet approval yesterday for expenditure of up to €100 million from within his existing departmental budget to pay down local authority loans on sites which can deliver accelerated social housing projects.

Local authorities are currently carrying around €309 million of land legacy debt, which are loans for land they bought in the past for development.

Government sources state that councils that have this debt on land, coupled with the costs of building a new home on that land, argue that building on such a site is not viable for them. 

The housing department believes that taking away the cost of the debt and interest owed will make it viable for a local authorities to deliver housing.

Local Authorities who can demonstrate they will begin building next year or in 2024, and that can use modern methods of construction, such as rapid build, will be assisted though this new initiative.  

The Government believes that the new initiative will unlock the potential of some of the sites and immediately deliver social housing developments with rapid builds and modern methods of construction, such as modular housing.

A similar scheme was set up in 2010 but scrapped in 2013 because it was deemed unsustainable. Under the Land Aggregation Scheme (LAGS), the land was transferred to a special-purpose body called Housing and Sustainable Communities for a nominal fee of €1. A total of 73 sites were accepted into the programme but only 36 were ready for immediate development. (The assets of this body were transferred to the Housing Agency as it is no longer in existence.) 

An audit in 2019 found that 98 social housing units had been completed on LAGS sites, despite an initial plan estimating the possibility of 3,370 homes.  A further 762 units were at various stages of physical development, of which 50 were to be made available to private tenants under the national cost rental model.

The new plan, which would see local authorities remain in control of the land and its potential, comes as opposition parties joined forces to back a Sinn Féin private members’ motion seeking to declare a “housing emergency”.

Housing Minister Darragh O’Brien last night defended his Housing for All plan, stating that Sinn Féin has not put forward any credible solutions. He said the Government’s housing policy is working. 

The Sinn Féin motion seeks to declare a ‘housing emergency’ as well as achieve support for the Raise the Roof protest in Dublin this Saturday, which is set to begin at Parnell Square at 1pm.