Barely a week goes by, it seems, without another damaging blow to the Government’s prospects of achieving the housing targets set out so confidently by both Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael during the general election. Last week, it was Housing Minister James Browne’s acknowledgment that delivery of new apartments in Ireland had “collapsed”.
Yesterday, it emerged that a vital revision of the country’s planning framework has been languishing for months in legislative limbo.
The Government’s official target of 50,500 new homes to be built per annum for the next five years has been described by experts as inadequate for the State’s projected needs. Yet, very few people with knowledge of the sector believe that even those targets will be reached. It is clear, as Taoiseach Micheál Martin has acknowledged, that a radical change of direction is required. Nevertheless, most of the recommendations of the Housing Commission continue to be ignored.
Given all this, it is inexcusable that bureaucratic inertia is clogging up the pipeline through which new housing must flow. The current National Planning Framework (NPF) is out of date and fails to reflect population growth or the Government’s own stated policy. This is preventing local government and planning authorities from doing the necessary work to ensure that those targets are met.
Tommy Tiernan to star in new Kevin Barry play as part of Abbey programme
Large and private Killiney five-bed with elegant interior on a third of an acre for €2m
Will I lose out on UK pension because I didn’t live there for three consecutive years?
Real Madrid open up old Liverpool wounds with Trent Alexander-Arnold move
A draft revision of the NPF, taking account of the new housing targets, was agreed last November, but the document has not yet been sent for approval by Government.
A recurring criticism of this administration and its predecessors is that, while they claim to recognise the enormity of the housing crisis and the need for urgent action, they have failed to treat it as a national emergency of the same order as Brexit or the financial crash. The lackadaisical approach to a vital element of the planning process suggests that criticism has some merit.
Echoing the Taoiseach, Browne has said “everything has to be on the table” when considering how to boost flagging housing supply. Both men seem to be referring to tax incentives for developers, an idea that has not been enthusiastically received by Minister for Finance Paschal Donohoe.
The Government is also reportedly looking at introducing restrictions on short-term letting via platforms such as AirBnB to free up properties for the domestic market. And it may seek to pressurise the banks to loosen lending requirements for housing developments.
Whether any of these comes to pass or has much of an impact, remains to be seen.
If not, then this Government is staring at the vista of its own abject failure to deliver on the single biggest promise it made to the electorate.
More importantly, hundreds of thousands of people will suffer as a consequence of that failure.
