Housing, Local Government and Heritage | The number of houses likely to become available from the private sector developments to meet the needs of local authority housing applicants over the next three years and the estimated time by which he expects sufficient reduction of applicants on local authority waiting lists to be made

QUESTION

To ask the Minister for Housing; Local Government and Heritage the number of houses likely to become available from the private sector developments to meet the needs of local authority housing applicants over the next three years; and if he will make a statement on the matter.

To ask the Minister for Housing; Local Government and Heritage to indicate, based on the current numbers of applicants on local authority housing lists, in respect of each county, if the estimated time by which he expects sufficient reduction of applicants on local authority waiting lists to be made; and if he will make a statement on the matter.

REPLY
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).

Housing for All required each local authority to prepare a Housing Delivery Action Plan to address social and affordable housing needs in their areas over the period 2022-2026, in line with targets set under  Housing for All.  The Plans include details of planned local authority, AHB and Part V delivery for social housing schemes.  A copy of each local authority’s Housing Delivery Action Plan is available on their websites.

A review and refresh of housing targets has commenced. The work will be underpinned by independent, peer-reviewed research by the ESRI. It will inform national and local housing targets, as well as subsets of social, affordable and private housing, and will ensure we provide enough of the right type of homes, in the right locations, to meet overall need. This work will have regard to detailed Census 2022 data published by the CSO. 

In 2023, there were 58,824 qualified for social housing whose need had not yet been met nationally. This shows a decline from 91,600 households in 2016 whose need had not yet been met when the SSHA began to be conducted annually.  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 SSHA provides a breakdown of categories such as age, household size and household composition. The published summaries for each SSHA since 2013 are available on the following link: https://www.gov.ie/en/collection/62486-summary-of-social-housing-assessments/

My Department publishes comprehensive programme-level statistics on a quarterly basis on social housing delivery activity by local authorities and AHBs in each local authority area. This data is available to the end of 2023 and is published on the statistics page of my Department’s website at the following link: https://www.gov.ie/en/collection/6060e-overall-social-housing-provision/

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. This includes details of which local authority or AHB delivered or is delivering the development. The most recent publication was for Quarter 4 2023. All Construction Status Reports are available at the following link: https://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, funding stream etc. at this link: https://data.gov.ie/dataset/social-housing-construction-status-report-q4-2023