157. Deputy Ged Nash asked the Tánaiste and Minister for Finance to confirm the date on which the expanded living cities initiative will be formally introduced; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [10467/26]

Sentiment score: 0.01

I raise with the Tánaiste the extension of the living cities initiative to five regional towns, including two in my constituency, Drogheda and Dundalk. When he has the opportunity he might state exactly when the initiative will go live for the new areas provided for under the Finance Act.

Sentiment score: 0.21

I thank the Tánaiste. We can all agree that vacancy and dereliction are a scourge in communities up and down the country. There is a particularly pronounced problem in my hometown of Drogheda. The Tánaiste will be aware of the extent of the problem in the historic core town centre of what is a very historic town, with some very significant buildings from an architectural and heritage point of view. Louth County Council did an analysis last year of the inner town centre area and identified approximately 58 vacant and derelict buildings. In fact, 46 of those are now in the area the council proposes the special regeneration area should service in the context of this scheme. Close to 600 applications have been made since the inception of the scheme a number of years ago. There is a real job of work to be done by the Department of Finance and Revenue Commissioners to ensure the newly expanded and enhanced scheme is accessible and people understand how they might use the scheme and how it might benefit them individually and the towns we represent.

Sentiment score: 0.16

It is one weapon in our armoury. There is no doubt about that but we need to take a varied approach to this. Another initiative, which was announced in the budget last year, was the transitioning of the derelict sites levy to a derelict sites tax. By definition, the responsibility for the collection of that tax will be given to the Revenue Commissioners. I have been campaigning for that for years; it makes sense. I always made the point that business owners who can afford to allow a building to become vacant and derelict must be quite wealthy because owners need to sweat every single asset they have to make sure their business is successful. Sometimes the only language that people understand is the brown envelope with the harp on it containing a tax demand. It is important we introduce that as quickly as possible. I am a bit confounded as to why it will take so long to introduce the tax, or transition from the levy to the tax. We have a very sophisticated system in Revenue. We could set up a very complex wage subsidy scheme practically overnight thanks to the expertise of officials in Revenue, the Department of Finance and elsewhere, with the support of IBEC, ICTU and so on. I am confounded as to why the derelict sites tax will take so long to introduce.

Sentiment score: 0.14