HOUSING MINISTER SIMON Coveney will today announce details of his plans to fast-track the delivery of homes in major urban centres.
He is to launch pillar three of the Rebuilding Ireland Plan, the Build More Homes initiative, which sets ambitious targets to double the annual level of houses being built to 25,000 homes.
It’s expected to announce the fast-track delivery arrangements for 30,000 new homes in major urban centres in Dublin, Cork and other urban locations around the country.
The minister has already launched plans to tackle the homelessness and social housing issues under the same action plan.
With this pillar, Coveney aims to boost construction of new affordable homes, which will benefit renters who are looking to get on the property ladder, said a government source.
The plan identifies a number of key sites around the capital which already have infrastructure, like roads, train stations and sewage, and are ready for building to begin.
Coveney will be joined today by a number of developers who have committed to start construction on land banks that have been lying vacant.
The first-time buyers grant announced in last month’s Budget has attracted criticism from opposition parties who criticise that it is only for new-build houses, many of which are out of reach for young couples.
The minister hopes this latest plan will help boost supply of affordable new-builds.
It’s understood that developers at today’s launch have committed to building houses on their respective sites, selling from €250,000.
A department source said today’s launch aims to build affordable homes in the Dublin commuter belt, in areas like Adamstown and Clonburris.
The event will also shine a light on developers that are sitting on land banks and not building.
“The infrastructure is in place on these sites, the additional infrastructure fund is in place and just this week the planning legislation that will fast-track planning permission for developers willing to build more than 100 properties has gone through this week,” said one department source.
Dublin City Council Principal Planning Adviser, Niall Cussen said there are 126 sites in the Dublin area that are producing an average of 40 homes per site.
“We need the big sites, 20,23 sites, to increase output. They’ve the potential for 30,000 new homes, right smack in the middle in the areas where the biggest demands are,” he said.
“If we are to achieve two of the core objectives of the action plan – increasing supply to a minimum of 25,000 homes per annum and providing the 47,000 social homes committed to we must speed up the processes that lead to housing delivery and we must make it cheaper to build homes,” said Coveney.
“On my part I have made a number of changes to the planning system to speed up the processes and reduce building costs, I have made funding available under Local Infrastructure Housing Activation Fund (LIHAF) and in Rebuilding Ireland I have set out a series of actions to fix the housing market.”
“We have an unbelievable package to get those sites moving,” said Cussen.
The minster said his plan will “change the way we deliver houses for people, to ensure there are no more excuses in the way for building enough houses for what’s required”.
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