Hear, hear.

Sentiment score: 0.00

155. Deputy Eoin Ó Broin asked the Minister for Housing, Local Government and Heritage to provide an update on the funding for inner-city flat complex regeneration in Dublin. [17587/26]

Sentiment score: 0.00

As the Minister knows, some of the worst quality rental accommodation in the State is the inner-city flat complexes owned by Dublin City Council built in the 1930s, 1940s and 1950s. There is widespread damp, sewage problems, overcrowding and decades of poor maintenance. While Dublin City Council has a comprehensive and ambitious plan to address those issues, the Department continues to put far too many barriers in its way. Will the Minister provide an update on funding applications and approvals specifically for the 1930s, 1940s and 1950s inner-city flat complex regeneration proposals?

Sentiment score: -0.18

The Minister is developing a terrible habit of spending most of his time talking about everything other than the actual question, which relates to the currently tenanted flat complexes, such as Oliver Bond House, St. Michan's House and Pearse House, where the Department is preventing, blocking and delaying the approval of funding. Initially it was because the national planning framework required that density be increased, and following the intervention of Dublin City Council and many of us on this side of the House that policy shifted. The current policy is that there can be no decrease in density as part of bringing these older flat complexes up to standard. That is simply not possible. We cannot ensure that the hard-working, rent-paying residents in Oliver Bond House, St. Michan's House, Pearse House and others get 21st-century minimum standards for rental accommodation without reducing density. There is no urgency or understanding, in my view, of the scale of the problem. What we want to know is when funding will be released so that the State, the largest landlord in the country, has the highest possible standards for its rental accommodation when, right now today in Dublin, the worst rental accommodation in our city is rental accommodation the State owns and the Minister is refusing to fund.

Sentiment score: -0.30

The only surprise that will be expressed following this debate is the surprise of the residents in the inner-city flat complexes listening to a Minister who clearly does not understand the scale of the problems. Someone living in an overcrowded flat that was built to 1930s or 1940s standards, which is riddled with damp, stinks of sewage and has a range of problems from rats to crumbling façades, needs to have that apartment fixed. This is not a question of density; it is a question of providing the funding so the State's own social rental homes meet minimum standards. If the properties were in the private rental sector, the local authorities would inspect and enforce. If these properties were in the AHB sector, the tenants would take their landlord to the Residential Tenancies Board. Right now, because of what the Minister has just said, because he has admitted what the barrier is, we are forcing social housing tenants, council tenants and working and rent-paying tenants to live in substandard and what are effectively illegal properties. When will the Minister wake up and realise the scale of the problem and release the funding to do one thing and one thing only, which is to bring these homes up to modern standards?

Sentiment score: -0.10

"But". That is the problem. It is the "but".

Sentiment score: -0.13

But the Department is not approving the funding applications.

Sentiment score: 0.00

No, the national planning framework makes it about density.

Sentiment score: -0.30

We told you. There is a national planning objective, legally binding, in the national planning framework.

Sentiment score: 0.05

No. Your national planning framework made it about density. What utter nonsense.

Sentiment score: -0.23