Development of Social Housing since Rent Rebate

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WRITTEN QUESTION TO THE MINISTER FOR HOUSING BY DEPUTY T.A. VALLOIS OF ST. SAVIOUR

ANSWER TO BE TABLED ON TUESDAY 16th APRIL 2013

Question

Could the Minister advise how many social housing units have been built since the beginning of rent rebate/abatement per annum and how much of the Housing Department's income has been returned to the Treasury per year during the same period?

Answer

Firstly, I would like to point out a very clear distinction between Income Support process and the old Rent Rebate and Abatement scheme. There was no annual return made to the Treasury Department with Rent Rebate or Abatement scheme, the cost of which was covered by the then Housing Committees existing budget.

The Rent Rebate and Abatement scheme was put into place in May 1990.

The Department of Environment monitors housing supply on an annual basis, they keep records based  on  net  completions  (i.e.  completed  homes  minus  homes  lost  through  demolition, conversion etc).

The attached table shows the net annual completions of purpose built social rented homes since 1990. It shows that a net total of some 1561 such homes have been built up to the end of 2012 according to the Department of Environment's records.

The current Income Support Scheme was implemented in 2008 and the Housing Departments annual return to Treasury is also listed on the table below for those years.

 Social rented housing completions 1990-2012

Table 1: Social rented homes completed since 1990 (net)