Government ‘needs to step up the finance’ for tenant-in-situ scheme as Cork city tenants left in limbo

A family who had been told Cork City Council would buy their rental home are “devastated” as the council did not receive enough central Government funding to continue its acquisitions scheme.

Jason Cashman is one of what is understood to be multiple tenants whose future is now uncertain.

“We’re on the housing list 16 and a half years, and we were receiving HAP [Housing Assistance Payment] for the house we’re in at the moment in White’s Cross,” he told The Echo. “The landlord decided to sell, and he’s a gentleman so he offered to sell it to the council to keep us where we are.

“We’ve been here the last seven or eight years. We went through a whole process with the tenant-in-situ scheme last August, and were told by the council that the funding for 2024 had run out and we had to wait for this year’s funding. Then we got a confirmation at the end of January that the council would put a deposit on the house, it went sale agreed, but since then we’ve heard nothing — we thought it was just going through the legalities.

“We found out on Tuesday that the funding has been pulled on the house.”

“Now we’re in a situation that we don’t know what’s happening,” Mr Cashman continued.

“I don’t know how I’m going to tell my seven-year-old son that he has to move out of his home — his school is right outside the housing estate, and our three-year-old is in preschool just up the road. They’ve lived here their whole life, this will have a devastating effect on them.”

The tenant-in-situ scheme allows local authorities to purchase rental properties from landlords who are selling, ensuring that tenants who would otherwise face eviction due to the sale can continue to rent from the authority.

A circular issued by the Department of Housing to Cork City Council on March 31 said that a capital funding allocation of €20m will be provided for 2025.

This funding allocation relates to the programme of acquisitions in 2025 for four priority categories, including tenant-in-situ.

“After reviewing the current programme and financial commitments carried over from 2024, we have determined that the allocated funding has been exhausted,” a council spokesperson told The Echo. “In summary, the initial funding allocation received by Cork City Council is inadequate to fulfil its existing commitments and the projected programme for 2025.

“The council is discussing the matter with the Department of Housing, Local Government and Heritage, and we envisage that commitments will be honoured.

“However, the progression of any additional purchases under the acquisitions programme for 2025 is ceased with immediate effect.”

Speaking to The Echo, Independent Ireland TD for Cork North-Central Ken O’Flynn said that commitments must be fulfilled.

“The Government needs to step up the finance. Cork City Council was an honest broker in this,” he said, adding that he has written to the ministers for finance and housing, calling on them to provide adequate funding.

His party colleague and father, councillor Noel O’Flynn, said: “The council have been left short by the Government, and families are going to be discommoded…

“These people have been looking forward to the security of being a tenant for life, now they don’t know where they will end up.”

Sinn Féin is to hold a protest outside City Hall at 1pm today, calling on the Government to provide adequate funding for Cork City Council to continue the tenant-in-situ scheme.