Subsidies of up to €144,000 per unit for builders but no discount for buyers
With a target of just 45 affordable houses a year in Louth, Sinn Féin TD Imelda Munster has lambasted the government’s lack of provision of social housing in Louth, saying it’s “shocking in its lack of ambition.”
Deputy Munster was speaking following the release of figures from the Department of Housing that show the government’s affordability target under the affordable housing fund for Louth between 2022-2026 is 226. This amounts to 45 affordable houses on average a year.
“Forty five affordable houses a year is a paltry target” she said. “It shows where the government’s priorities lie, and that’s certainly not with the provision of affordable or social housing for people in Louth.
“This week we saw that the government is going to hand over €450m of taxpayers’ money to property developers to subsidise apartment delivery without any affordability dividend for the purchasers under the Croí Cónaithe Cities Scheme.
“This scheme will provide subsidies of up to €144,000 per unit without offering any market discount for potential buyers.
“This shows in black and white that this government is backing developers and is doing very little to help people. It’s classic Fianna Fáil housing policy – gifting huge sums of money to developers and doing nothing to help people struggling to afford housing.
“A document from the Housing Agency which the Business Post reported on last Sunday, shows it is anticipated that the open market value of a two-bed apartment delivered through the scheme will be €390,000 and a three-bed apartment is anticipated to have an open market value of at least €450,000.
“Like the other inflationary schemes such as Help to Buy and Shared Equity First Home scheme, these unaffordable prices will be locked in and ordinary people will still not be able to afford to buy a home.
“What galls me about this scheme is that the money could easily be put to such good use. Sinn Féin has a plan, which we brought to the Dáil last week that would have redirected this funding and funding from the Shared Equity scheme towards the provision of 4,000 genuinely affordable houses a year.
“That’s a damn sight better than 45 houses a year.
“People in Louth deserve better. We need a decent allocation of both affordable and social housing to ease the crisis that has been ongoing for years now. This government has made it clear that they are not willing to do that.”
