Government ‘committed to housing pledge’

THE Government is determined to deliver the 10,000 affordable houses promised to low-income workers under the new Sustaining Progress deal, the Department of the Environment insisted last night.

It was responding to the Fine Gael claim that it will be impossible for the Government to deliver this number of houses within the two years that are left in the current pay deal.

Fine Gael’s Environment spokesman Bernard Allen said he could not see the Government fulfilling this target when not one of the promised 10,000 affordable houses has been built yet.

“Construction has not even started on one of these houses and the Government has been very slow in identifying sites that could be used for this scheme,” Mr Allen said.

However, the Department of the Environment insisted last night that its objective is to deliver this number of affordable houses within the lifetime of the Sustaining Progress agreement.

“It takes an average of 18 months for a house to come on stream once the site has been identified because you have to go through the planning process, install the infrastructure and build the house,” the department spokesman said.

Taoiseach Bertie Ahern revealed at the weekend that the Government has released further lands in Dublin, Cork and Waterford for this affordable housing deal that will allow 3,600 low and middle-income earners to buy their own homes.

Mr Ahern has already announced that four other sites in Dublin, Meath and Kildare have been released by the Government for this scheme which will allow a total of 6,100 affordable houses to be built and the Government is continuing to identify other suitable sites around the country.

Mr Allen claimed that many of the sites revealed by the Taoiseach were already in public ownership and could have been released for this scheme when it was first announced almost a year ago.

But the Department of the Environment rejected this claim and said these sites could not have been released a year ago because they had to work with local authorities to identify what sites could be made available for this scheme.

The Government along, with the social partners, signed up to the Sustaining Progress deal and central part of that agreement was the commitment to build the affordable houses, said the department spokesman.

“And the Government has already demonstrated its commitment to this deal by securing land for over 6,000 of these houses and it will continue to work with the social partners to identify more suitable sites.”

Mr Allen questioned how lands released at the Youghal Road in Cork city could be used for affordable housing when the area in question is zoned recreational and used for football and pitch and putt.

The spokesman said all applications for affordable housing would have to go through the proper planning process.