Dun Laoghaire-Rathdown County Council directly built only 4 homes last year, figures show

Dun Laoghaire-Rathdown County Council directly built four homes in 2022, recently released figures show.

According to data published by the local authority, it built four homes last year, acquired 57 through Part V legislation, and 144 were developed through Approved Housing Bodies (AHBs).

Overall, DLRCoCo’s target of constructing 450 homes through direct build, Part V, or AHBs was missed by 245, having only built 205.

In 2021, the local authority directly built 50 homes, while 106 were constructed through AHBs, and 31 through Part V legislation.

Under Part V legislation, developers must assign a certain percentage of the homes built in a development to the local authority as social housing.

In a statement to Southside People, Dun Laoghaire-Rathdown County Council said: “Local Authority direct build is only one of the methods available to deliver homes and while there were only four dwellings delivered under our own build programme last year, there was a total of 205 units delivered by DLR in 2022 in partnership with AHB’s and through Part V.

“In addition, construction continued on 61 dwellings in Ballyogan which are due for delivery in Q2 2023 and the construction of a further 212 dwellings commenced on site during the year.

“Other schemes are being progressed and are at various stages of design, planning and tender involved in construction process.”

Dublin-Rathdown Sinn Fein representative Shaun Tracey said these figures should be a “wake-up call for the council.

“All three TDs in Dublin Rathdown are Government Ministers.

“They alongside their council colleagues are failing miserably.

“They must accept that their current housing plan which is underpinned by the belief that the private sector can solve the housing emergency is failing ordinary workers and families across Dublin Rathdown.

“They should be arguing to increase the national and local targets for the delivery of social and affordable housing to buy or rent built by local authorities across the state with financial support from Government.”

Tracey says that all “available resources, including all suitable, publicly owned lands in the borough, must be urgently used to directly build social and affordable homes.

“Every effort must be made to deliver social and genuinely affordable housing on public sites such as the Central Bank land in Sandyford, land at Leopardstown Racecourse and the Mount Anville site in Stillorgan.

“Every week I am contacted by families who are desperate to be housed by the council, many of them facing homelessness or in overcrowded and unsuitable accommodation.

“These figures are a slap in the face to all those people and act as further evidence as to why we need real change at both a local and national level.”