40% on Cork housing waiting list are single

Over 40% of home seekers on a Cork County Council waiting list are separated or divorced.

Tue, 12 May, 2015 - 01:00

Sean O’Riordan

The local authority is reviewing its accommodation strategy as it emerged 2,983 of the 6,974 applicants described themselves as single.

Seamus McGrath (FF), chairman of the council’s housing special purposes committee, said that the situation needed to be urgently addressed.

He said the council had decided to allocate 20% of its vacant two-bed units to single occupants.

“We want to rebalance and instill some fairness and equity into our [housing] policy,” he said.

Noel Collins (Ind) welcomed the initiative but asked if the council was going to build or purchase more two-bed homes to make any serious inroads into the waiting lists.

Des O’Grady (SF) said a newly unveiled Government policy on social housing proposed a 25% fall in waiting lists in the next four years.

“I don’t think that target is achievable. It’s going in the right direction, but not half fast enough,” he said.

Deirdre Forde (FG) said the council should examine removing pensioner tenants from three and four bedroom council homes, if they now lived alone, and accommodate them in smaller units. She said the proposal would free-up larger properties for needy families.

Andrias Moynihan (FF) said: “For far too long, single men have been at the bottom of the pile when it comes to housing.”

However, party colleague Bob Ryan was concerned that the number of two-bed homes becoming available would do very little to cut the huge waiting list for single people.

Council chief executive Tim Lucey said he would give a six-month progress report.

He urged councillors to consider Ms Forde’s suggestion about downsizing.

Meanwhile, some councillors criticised the government’s delay in launching a new tenant purchase scheme which would allow tenants to become home owners.

Mr McGrath said it had been 30 months since the last such scheme ended.

Gerard Murphy (FG) said he believed a new scheme was about to be announced and voluntary agencies should be included.