Fast-tracking housing without the mistakes

Housing Minister Simon Coveney wants to lead this country out of its housing emergency and he has a number ideas to facilitate the fast-tracking of housing development, while keeping a robust planning process, writes Juno McEnroe

Children sleeping in cars; spiralling rents; a stalled construction industry; restricted mortgage lending; evictions and over a 100 families becoming homeless a month.

This is modern Ireland and a deep rooted housing emergency has now gripped the country. Solving it or even just easing the crisis is no easy task. There are families crying out for affordable rents or house-buying schemes but also so-called nervous landlords who want tax cuts or financial incentives to build. The Government doesn’t have a bottomless money pit to throw cash at the problem. Nonetheless, intervention is necessary. It will need to be done with surgical precision, quickly and with the support of groups dealing with the housing shortage.