The Coalition has claimed a major triumph in halting the mortgage arrears crisis by curbing the power of banks to block debt deals — despite the fact that only 115 have ever been vetoed by lenders.

Cork City Council has revealed that it received 243 refusals to offers of housing last year.

Lisa O’Sullivan, who is almost completely blind, was on the housing list in Cork for nearly eight years before she was eventually housed by a housing association.

Private finance can help to provide homes to thousands of people on social housing waiting lists.

THE bursting of the property bubble may benefit some of the poorer members of society, as apartments built in anticipation of the boom years continuing are sold to social housing projects to cover debts.

THERE’S scarcely a town or village in the country, never mind a city, without a so-called ‘problem estate’ in which houses have fallen into disrepair and the overall appearance is shabby and depressed.