Dublin Labour MEP Proinsias De Rossa has called on the Government to use the new EU social housing funding rules changes agreed today by the European Parliament to tackle Ireland's social housing crisis and abandon the 'developer-bailout' policy it inaugurated last year.

Mr De Rossa said: "The fact that just 900 social and affordable homes were acquired by local authorities in the first half of 2009, compared to 4,800 in all of 2008, is a clear indication that as cutbacks in public spending begin to bite, those who are most in need are bearing the brunt of our economic problems. Over 100,000 people are now languishing on local authorities' waiting lists, up 20,000 on 2008.

“The Government's policy, announced last summer by Minister Finneran, of leasing some of the estimated 140,000 vacant homes from developers over a 20-year period is in reality nothing more than a thinly disguised, two-pronged bailout for Fianna Fail's developer friends that will deliver little or no value to the tenant or to the public purse in the long run.

“My colleague Ciaran Lynch TD has already established that this would involve the State handing over somewhere in the region of €240,000 per house over this period - or half a billion euro in total - at the end of which the tenant would have no rights and the State would own nothing.

“Instead, the Government should use the opportunity presented by the new EU social housing funding rules to instigate a genuine social housing policy involving the purchase of vacant properties and making them available to families who need them.

“Under the existing EU regulation, European Regional Development Funds can only be used to improve or provide social housing in the 12 countries that joined the EU after 2004. Under the new rules approved today, while no extra funds are being provided, part of every Member States' allocation of ERDF funds could be re-allocated (to a maximum of 4% of their total allocation) to 'co-finance' the renovation or provision of social housing.

“The value of property in Ireland is lower than at any stage for years, presenting the Government with an opportunity to purchase homes for social housing. National and EU monies used to in this way would remain a public asset, and would not simply disappear into a black hole owned by some developer. Furthermore, a home renovation scheme partly funded by the EU would get thousands of builders back to work.”