Mayo County Council defends housing record after 100 homeless people use emergency accommodation

MAYO County Council has defended its record on housing despite one TD labelling the number of houses it built in 2023 as ‘shameful and shocking’.

According to the latest figures, 104 people accessed emergency accommodation in Mayo in February, including 76 single adults.

This comes as Mayo County Council built 61 social houses in 2023, some way short of the 151 houses it was to deliver under the government’s Housing For All plan.

However, the council’s top official for housing has said that the council delivered more units than other local authorities when acquisitions, leasing, and RAS and HAP tenancies are taken into account.

Tom Gilligan, Mayo County Council’s Director of Services for Housing, told The Mayo News that the local authority delivered 322 houses last year.

Of these, 55 were built by the council while a further six units were delivered under Part 5 – a stipulation that social houses make up a percentage of houses in new estates.

Of these, 50 were in Rehins Fort in Ballina, which was officially opened last November.

Mr Gilligan said that several projects which were to be delivered in 2023 by Approved Housing Bodies (AHBs) were due to progress in 2024.

Mayo County Council was given a target of 730 new builds to be delivered by 2026 under Housing For All but aims to deliver 1,004 in that timeframe. Acquisitions and leasing are not counted among those figures under the Housing For All criteria.

The council had set itself a target of 225 new social houses 2023 - 164 short of the figure it delivered last year.

“With 55 local authority new builds, Mayo County Council’s programme was actually in excess of several other local authorities for 2023,” Mr Gilligan said.

“Mayo County Council works collaboratively and has a good relationship with AHBs but unfortunately a number of key projects that were to be delivered by the AHB sector in areas such as Castlebar, Newport and Knock were unable to get over the line last year and the plan is to progress these projects in 2024.

“In addition, Mayo County Council does not benefit from Part V new builds in comparison with other local authorities. Last year's figure of six Part V new builds for Mayo was 28th lowest out of 31 local authorities with only Cavan, Longford and Leitrim having fewer completions.”

This comes as Mayo Sinn Féin TD Rose Conway-Walsh has lashed out at the local authority’s delivery on social housing.

Calling for a general election, Deputy Conway Walsh also blasted the rate of homelessness as a ‘grim milestone’.

“Mayo County Council built more houses in 2019 than they did this year despite all other talk from this government on housing,” she said, referring to the 83 units it built in 2019.

“There are currently 1,235 people on the housing lists. Many others are excluded. But everyone suffers when the government fails to deliver social and affordable homes because it means less supply and higher prices and rents.

“These failures have deep and lasting effects on the people and communities in Mayo,” she added.

Elsewhere, new reports have revealed that Mayo remains one of the most affordable counties to purchase a house, despite ongoing price rises.

The latest Daft.ie House Price Report for Quarter 1 of 2024, the average listed price of a house in Mayo has risen by over 4.2 percent in a year to €200,008.

This represents a 2.3 percent rise on the previous quarter and an 86.9 percent rise from Daft.ie’s lowest recorded figure.

Prices in Mayo range from €80,000 for a one-bedroom apartment to €274,000 for a five-bedroom detached house.

According to Daft.ie, the average listed house price in Ireland stands at €326,469.

New research from Switcher.ie also revealed that Mayo is the fifth-most affordable area in Ireland to buy a house.

On average, joint first-time buyers need an average of 2.9 years to save for a deposit for a house.

This calculation was made based on a joint income of €75,496 and a house valued at €210,500.

This compared to Dún Laoghaire, the least affordable district in the country, where first-time buyers would need to save for an average of 27.9 years to save for a deposit.