Over €210m allocated for provision of social housing

OVER €210 million has been set aside for Approved Housing Bodies (AHBs) to provide social housing for Dublin City Council over the next three years.

The city council say objectives in the Housing Delivery Action Plan (HDAP) 2022-26 is that 50 per cent of social housing would be delivered by AHBs.

According to the city council’s Capital Programme 2023-2025, published this week, AHBs continue to be a “major contributor” in providing social housing through capital and revenue funding.

“The ability of AHBs to source non[1]state funding is important as a way of helping to achieve the council’s overall housing objectives,” stated the report.

As such, a provision of €210.39m is provided in the Capital Budget for the three-year period 2023-2025.

Total estimated expenditure for capital works in the 2023-25 programme for housing and building is budgeted at €1.807bn.

The AHB schemes will be delivered under the Capital Assistance Scheme (CAS) and the Capital Advanced Leasing Facility (CALF).

CAS and CALF social housing units to be delivered include Long Mile Road (152 units), where construction is underway, and St Michael’s, Inchicore (52), which is in the supply pipeline for CAS social housing units.

The council say it continues to support AHBs in delivering housing through capital grants from the Department of Housing, the provision of sites for new builds, transfer of housing stock in need of refurbishment and the acquisition of units from Part V.

Delivery mechanisms, such as the Public Private Partnership (PPP) model, will also play an “increasingly significant role” in housing output over the next number of years.

DCC is the largest landlord in the country and manages and maintains over 26,000 housing units, approximately 12,500 of these are in apartment schemes and many are still in need of substantial works due to their age.