Time to act over ‘dormant’ properties?

Sir, – The Dormant Accounts Act was introduced to deal with the matter of dormant property (ie cash).

Might I suggest that a similar approach be made to what appears to be a massive amount of unoccupied (“dormant”) housing property?

Surely the constitutional property rights apply to both types of “property”, but was not any legal deterrent in dealing with the cash-type of property.

With a reported 200,000 or so unoccupied houses to choose from, it should be possible in principle to deal with the housing crisis very rapidly with a similar Act – at least to give time (say five years) to actually build the required social houses during the crisis – after which the “dormant” houses would revert for the use of their owners.

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Has anyone a better suggestion? – Yours, etc,

RJ CLOUGHLEY,

Terenure,

Dublin 6W.