Dublin councils predict dramatic shift from leased social housing to new-builds

Two of the largest councils in the State will tell a parliamentary committee on Tuesday that they will deliver almost 19,000 new social and affordable houses over the next five years.

Both Dublin City Council (DCC) and Dun Laoghaire Rathdown County Council (DLRCC) will disclose the the Oireachtas Committee on Housing that they are in a position to substantially increase the provision of new-build houses and apartments over the next five years from a base of less than 1,800 delivered between 2018 and 2021.

In an opening statement submitted to the committee ahead of Tuesday’s meeting, DCC chief executive Owen Keegan said it has a “strong pipeline” of designated sites for the delivery of over 15,000 social, cost rental and affordable homes in the coming year.

That would represent a large multiple of new-builds the council has delivered in the three years between 2019 and 2021. During that time, it provided a total of 1,185 new builds between social housing, affordable housing and social houses acquired from private developers of new housing schemes under Part V of the Planning and Development Act (which requires that a percentage of any new development be ring-fenced for social housing).

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In 2021, Dublin City Council delivered only 355 new builds. In the same period over 10,000 of the units DCC has used for social housing were leased, mainly under the Housing Assistance Payment (HAP) scheme.

In his statement, Mr Keegan has said the last few years have been challenging in terms of social housing delivery.

“Covid lockdowns, curtailed supply chains, high construction price inflation and general market uncertainty have disrupted new housing delivery,” he said.

Mr Keegan said the council was committed to move away from leasing residential units, to provide newly built homes to families and individuals. He predicted the council would meet its target of 895 new-build units in 2022.

Dun Laoghaire Rathdown County Council chef executive Frank Curran said it had provided a total of 888 new-build homes in the four year period between 2018 and 2021 (an average of 220 per annum). The number of new builds fell to only 86 in 2020, a year affected by Covid restrictions.

However, Mr Curran said the council has estimated it will deliver 3,867 new housing units in the five year period from 2022 to 2026 (760 per annum), comprising local authority houses, affordable and cost rental homes, as well as affordable homes. That represents a three-fold increase.

In his invitation to both councils, the chair of the housing committee Steven Matthews (Green Party) asked them to address the issue of vacancy and dereliction. In their opening statements, both councils have said there were challenges involved with repurposing vacant sites and buildings into social housing.

“There are significant complexities and costs in acquiring and redeveloping these housing units. Frequently the rehabilitation of vacant units does not offer ‘value for money’ in strict financial terms,” said Mr Keegan.

He also said the conversion of vacant commercial and retail units also had the potential of creating major difficulties in terms of compliance with planning and building regulation.

He added, however, that the council’s vacant homes team had identified some 650 vacant homes with potential for redevelopment.

Mr Curran said there were very few vacant properties in his council area because of high demand for rented property.

“The vacancy rate for Dún Laoghaire-Rathdown is 5.5 per cent (CSO 2016). This is the third lowest in the country and is consistent with that of a normal functioning housing market,” he said.