Public housing will not be for everyone, warns minister
Commission on housing to back private ownership
A PROPOSED Commission on Housing could provide legal advice to Government on demands for a right to housing being enshrined in law but will not discourage or de-prioritise private home ownership.
The expert body to examine housing was mooted in the Programme for Government, but has yet to be set up.
However, Housing Minister Darragh O’Brien has already dampened hopes that it could lead to “public housing for everyone”.
“If the Commission can assist in bringing about some political consensus well then, yes, great,” he said yesterday, “but I think we’ve got to be more honest with ourselves in the political debate as to what’s achievable, too; what’s legal, what’s constitutional.
“We’re not just going to be able to turn a tap on that provides public housing for everyone.”
Mr O’Brien said the Commission’s job would be to “take the long-term view on matters like tenure” – the rights that accrue to renters or property owners – as Ireland’s population grows.
“It can’t be a group that makes recommendations with no reality to implementing those suggestions,” he told a webinar organised by the Dublin Economics Workshop. “I want advice that I can act on.”
There is no right to public housing in the Irish constitution, but Solidarity-People Before Profit TD Richard Boyd Barrett introduced a private members’ bill on the issue in July last year.
The Programme for Government has promised a referendum on housing.
“I believe in public housing and in delivering good public housing,” Mr O’Brien said.
The Government will trial a ‘cost rental’ scheme this year, with plans to build 350 houses for working households that can’t cover their rent but don’t qualify for benefits.
The Government has also pledged to provide 50,000 social homes in 2021 and publish a new housing plan by the end of the year.
The minister said the aim of the Commission was not to discourage home ownership.
“Home ownership is not something that should fall down the list,” Mr O’Brien said. “We have a whole generation of people that see the whole dream of home ownership slipping away from them.”
He said the “potential benefits of establishing an advisory commission are agreed” and he is “currently scoping the most appropriate type of structure for the Commission and fleshing out the issues that it will be tasked with examining”.
The Government will trial a ‘cost rental’ scheme this year, with plans to build 350 houses for working households that can’t cover their rent but don’t qualify for benefits.
The Economic and Social Research Institute said recently that just 20,000 homes are expected to be completed this year, well below the 30,000 needed to keep up with Ireland’s population increase.