Ivana Bacik Slams Government Over 'War on Dereliction'

Taoiseach, the Minister for Housing has declared a war on dereliction, fighting talk and a striking turn of phrase and this is your government's tactic. Flood the airwaves with repeat announcements, deflect responsibility and spin your failures to save face. This week the Tánaiste sought to pin responsibility for vacancy and dereliction on councils alone, a convenient distraction from years of government failure. Who has been in charge of national housing policy for the last decade? You and the Tánaiste. But Taoiseach, for years you've ignored the growing number of vacant and derelict properties blighting the country. Meanwhile rents and house prices have spiralled, homelessness continues to rise and people are losing hope. After years of inaction, it seems the best response from your government will be a thinly veiled attempt to pass the buck. Taoiseach, what has this so-called war on dereliction delivered? A delayed measure, already announced in last year's budget, the renaming of a 35-year-old levy and a promise that revenue will now collect it. Now if it worked, this could be significant. But as with so many of your housing plans, it's a half-measure, delayed and diluted and arbitrarily deployed, initially only to urban areas with populations of 4,000 or more, as if dereliction didn't affect small towns and villages. Well we all know it's a blight on every community. PAYE tax, Taoiseach, is paid by every employee. So why this selective approach? You've said you're phasing it in, but why this approach and why rule out these small towns and villages which are also blighted by dereliction? Taoiseach, speculators and land hoarders in every part of the country, not just in larger urban centres, they're profiting from the misery caused by the chronic shortage of homes. So unless this new tax is set at an effective and meaningful level, speculators will keep sitting on their assets, literally. Derelict buildings on empty streets across the country will remain a visual reminder of your failure to get off the fence and fix housing. And we're all hearing from people who are directly affected by this. Every day I hear from people who have received an eviction notice and who can find nowhere else, nowhere to rent and nowhere to buy. And in each case, in each family situation, there are heartbreaking situations, Taoiseach. I'm supporting one such mother of three who's had her eviction notice and now feels she has no option but to overhaul. She and her young family have literally nowhere to go. And in Dublin Bay South, they see vacant houses and derelict sites all around them. Taoiseach, people like that young mother need you to act now on dereliction. The Labour Party are calling for the introduction of compulsory sales orders, a new mechanism to force persistently vacant and derelict properties back into use. We're calling on you to fund vacancy and dereliction teams in local authorities across the country. Taoiseach, you're not a commentator. You've been in government effectively for a decade. So when will you and your ministers stop blaming everyone else for the vacancy and dereliction crisis? And will you introduce the stronger measures needed to bring empty homes back into use and to generate greater housing supply to fix this housing crisis? Thank you, Deputy. Taoiseach, please. Just to say, I came back into government in 2020. I wasn't in government for the last decade. Facts matter. I didn't have the executive authority that we now have. And the most significant measure that we have taken in terms of dereliction is the introduction of the derelict grant to refurbish derelict housing and vacant houses. No question about it. And I took a personal interest in that because I could walk up. As I walked either rural areas or urban areas, I could see dereliction. And Minister Darrabein at the time introduced it. And 17,000 and a half thousand applications is no mean change. And 13,000 approved. And so that has been a significant initiative. So it's not years doing nothing. That is a very significant measure that you choose to ignore. And about 285 million paid out by Q1 2026. And that grant scheme has been extended to 2030. The vacant above the shop grant will do significant work as well, in my view. The government has allocated 150 million through the urban regeneration development fund to tackle vacancy and dereliction. And 142 million has already been allocated. Again, this kind of charge of inaction as if nothing's happening is just not true. And there are many more initiatives as well. The government launched a CPO activation program in 2023 to support proactive local authority acquisition of vacant and derelict properties. About 11,000 plus properties engaged. 400 CPOs commenced. 250 plus completed. And proposals are also being advanced to centralize certain CPO powers through Uncommissioned Planona. And again, the existing unpaid derelict site levies will remain a charge on affected properties and continue to be collected by local authorities. And again, could I say that in terms of the derelict sites, the replacement of the derelict sites levy with the tax. I think we'd all have to agree, it seems very clear to me, you mentioned 35 years to derelict sites. Like, does anybody acknowledge that there's been some weakness here, I mean, in local government in terms of implementing derelict sites levy? No, no, but you choose to blame central government. Like, we need to make up our mind in the Oireachtas. When we delegate and when we give powers to local authorities, there comes a time when there has to be accountability from local authorities as well. And when you look at the tables in terms of who did what at local authority level, there's differences. Some far more proactive than others. But no one wants to, on the opposition side, ever want to criticize that aspect of it, because it has to be government's fault for everything. So we have a very kind of double standard approach to a regional delegation of power devolution or local authority devolution. Yes, the reason we were transferring this to revenue, because we believe that revenue has a kind of, has a tendency to concentrate the mind a bit more, maybe, than obviously local authorities have had. Bottom line. And when people see revenue coming, I think behaviour will change. But we're going to have to do it in a comprehensive way. Thank you Taoiseach. We're going to have to do it in a proper, precise way. Again, illustrating some degree of inaction by local authorities. Time is up Taoiseach. Deputy Batchick will respond now. Thank you. Deputy Batchick. Well, Taoiseach, I've listened carefully, and your answer is again a textbook response by government. And people like the young mother in my constituency are sick of central government looking to claim ownership for any wins, but absolutely looking to absolve themselves of the responsibility for any failures. And so your bug passing to local authorities, it's utterly shameless, and it's meaningless to people who are looking for action. Yes, of course we acknowledge a third of local authorities collected no derelict sites tax revenue in 2024. Clearly there are issues with the existing model, but you're a central government. It's your job to fix it. And I have two questions, because you've no sense of urgency, and there's no sense of urgency from you on these new announcements. First, why are you introducing this new tax on a selective basis? Why, when PAYE employees have to pay, when all employees have to pay PAYE, why is this new tax, even once it finally comes in, going to be confined to urban areas with a population of 4,000 or more? Has there been pressure from somewhere? Why is this arbitrary distinction made? Thank you Deputy. Time is up. Isn't it true that the new tax won't be collected until 2028 at the earliest? Taoiseach to respond now. First of all, the point I'm making to you is the reason it's over 4,000. First of all, that's where the greatest need is in terms of housing need, and it's where the greatest degree of dereliction obviously is, but it's also the first phase of this, because this is a mammoth task. Notwithstanding the derelict sites act being there, the database as inherited is not sufficient to immediately introduce a tax when we don't have a comprehensive database around derelict registers across the length and breadth of the country. This is a tax now that's coming in, so it has to be done properly, and it has to be done in a very precise, effective way that will make a difference. So it's very important we get it right and do it properly. We brought in the Living City Initiative, we expanded that in the last budget. That's going to help significantly in regeneration in cities as well. The URDF Fund, the Rural Community Development Fund, is doing an awful lot of work in towns across the country and in the cities in terms of bringing back to life city streets as well. And, you know, sometimes people might say you're textbook opposition, that everything has to be the government's fault. But I mean, the point I would make to you is this, a lot of progress has been made in a lot of areas.