New social housing builds at a 50-year high — Taoiseach

Taoiseach Micheál Martin has defended the Government’s record on social housing, saying that despite a failure to meet its 2024 target, new builds were at a 50-year high.

Last year, the State built 7,871 new social homes, missing its target of 9,300 by 1,429, or 15%.

Speaking to The Echo, Mr Martin accepted that there had been a shortfall, but said the number of social home builds over the past four years has been unprecedented in recent times.

“You’d have to go back to 1975 to see so many social houses actually built, but I want to get to a situation where we have 10,000 social houses built a year, and then we can add to that through some acquisitions, but I want to reduce that,” he said.

“Because if we have a steady build of 10,000 a year, we wouldn’t need to be going to the private sector to be buying social houses or leasing them, and I think that’s the optimal way to do it in to the future.”

Mr Martin said he had been speaking to the housing minister about ramping up the number of new social homes built this year by local authorities.

“Some councils are better than others,” he said.

“Up the country, some councils are very poor at delivering social houses and all councils will have to pull their weight, in terms of providing an adequacy of social houses, because if you build enough social houses you take pressure off the HAP (housing assistance payment) scheme, you take pressure of the private rental sector, and also take pressure off young couples trying to buy houses.

“You don’t want young couples buying houses in competition with county councils.

“That’s why having a good critical mass of social houses built makes sense and that’s why I’m very keen on that, and [housing minister] James Browne is as well.”

Asked to rate the performances of Cork city and county councils on the delivery of social housing, the Taoiseach said they had been “quite good”.

“If you combine their own builds with approved bodies they’re supporting, it’s been quite good, and they’re pressing ahead, and they’ve been ahead of targets.”