The incoming Government was urged to repeal the decision of outgoing Minister of State with responsibility for Housing, Michael Finneran TD to concentrate on leasing houses rather than construct them to fill the social housing needs in the country. The issue was flagged a number months ago that the Government wanted to enter into leasing schemes with developers rather have local authorities do their own construction. At a meeting of the Housing SPC of Mayo County Council, Mr Paul Benson from the council told the members: “We received a circular from the department in December which just copper fastens what we were being told for the past few months. The council is going to have no option but to enter into the leasing deals rather than start new construction projects.” He also told the meeting that the housing funding that would be made available to the council could be only 10 per cent of what it once was and that not many projects can be done with that. However, he went on to say that while this was the proposal at present legislation had to be brought in and that any new Government may decide to go a different way.
Independent Cllr Gerry Ginty told the meeting: “We have heard a lot of promises from what looks like will be the incoming Government and maybe we should hold our fire to give them a chance to see what they deliver on this issue. I appeal to the members of Fine Gael to put pressure on their people to ensure that this is changed. This will see people being put into estates with no prospect of ever buying their house because the council will not own them. You have to look at some of the estates around the county that are formerly council estates to look at the pride the people who bought their houses have taken in them.”
Mr Benson told the meeting that the uptake from developers had not been huge either. “We have received only 22 submissions from developers around the county at the last check. That is a very small number when you consider that there was a major national advertising campaign done on this. It seems that a lot of them do not want to get involved in a 10 or 20 year lease with the councils and would rather be rid of them than become landlords for that length of time.”
