MAJOR INVESTMENT WILL MAKE HUGE DENT IN SOCIAL HOUSING BACKLOG - KENNY

Posted on October 14, 2014 7:37 PM   |   Permanent Link   

Labour TD, Sean Kenny, has said that the massive investment in social housing will have a huge impact in dealing with the housing crisis.

"It has been increasingly obvious that Ireland has a serious problem with housing - a problem that has become a crisis. The Government has said that it would make housing a priority in its agenda, and this budget shows how serious the Government is in its intent."

"About €800 million will be spent on housing in 2015, which is 40% more than the 2014 housing budget. There will be a serious ramping up of construction and property acquisition specifically for local authority housing use, which will more than quadruple the amount of social housing units from 200 in 2014 to 946 in 2015. In total, 7,536 additional housing units will be built and when this is taken together with a planned 8,000 for transfers from Rent Supplement to the Housing Assistance Payment, a total of 15,925 housing units will be delivered in 2015."

"Also in 2015, 650 new housing units will be provided for people who have specific housing needs. Provision will also be made for 7,600 housing adaptation grants in order to assist people who need to adapt their houses to enable to continue living there and leading independent lifestyles."

"Another highly important aspect of this budget will be dealing with the acute problem of homelessness. The Government will be allocating a further €10.5 million to deal with this, and the total spending on homelessness will increase to €55.5 million in 2015. Safe, secure, affordable and adequate housing is essential in ensuring sustainable solutions to ending long-term homelessness."

"All of this is just the first step in a plan to be announced by Minister Kelly in the days to come, a plan to deliver up to 30,000 social houses to be built over the course of the next few years. This strategy for doing this is intended to support the construction sector and bring work to those who lost jobs in the economic crash, but in a more sustainable way. It will meet housing demand, again in a more sustainable way. The Government will not be returning to the hopelessly failed Fianna Fáil style boom and bust economic model of the past."

"This budget shows the very clear influence of Labour in Government. I will be doing my utmost to support Minister Kelly in his work in taking on the housing crisis and bringing it to an end."