Local Sinn Féin election candidate has said her party has a solid plan for housing in Ireland.
Ms Doherty said the reality is that we need to build more houses, we need to reform planning and we need to deliver a 100% Redress Scheme.
Ms Doherty said “It’s time to deliver more social and affordable houses and the only way to deliver that is too start the change in government by voting Sinn Féin on 7th June.”
She added that in the Milford Electoral area alone, there are hundreds of people on council waiting lists and similar numbers looking for transfers.
She said “The system is completely broken. We need to urgently build social and affordable housing this and the only way to address the deepening affordable and social housing crisis is for Government to dramatically scale up the delivery of public housing to meet social and affordable housing need, this included funding our local authorities, which included Donegal County Council, to do this. A key priority of Sinn Féin is to deliver 21,000 public homes to meet social and affordable housing need.”
She added that Sinn Féin have the plan to deliver this.
“The plan Sinn Féin aim to deliver on housing on the scale that is needed, is ambitious, but so it should be, our communities deserve no less. Almost 20% of our public housing delivery in 2023 would be from existing vacant and derelict housing stock. 4,000 of the 21,000 public homes would be from reused buildings.
Sinn Féin would also reform the Department of Housing’s Four Stage Approval Process to accelerate the delivery of public housing already in the pipeline, she went on.
“We also propose to significantly increase funding available to both Councils and the Bord to ensure they have the sufficient staff to make good quality planning decisions in a timely manner.
“These and other measures would free up additional capacity to focus on what would be a Sinn Féin government’s key priority of delivering 21,000 public homes to meet social and affordable housing need.”
She said Sinn Féin are giving a clear commitment that if they are in government, they will deliver a genuine 100% Redress Scheme for all of the homeowners living in their primary principal residence and for landlords with one property, delivered by the State, from start to finish, rather than a grant scheme.
Ms Doherty said “This will be a like for like re-build to modern standards with an option for self-build, if the homeowner wishes. We have committed to working with the campaign leaders on implementing their “People’s Document. From our perspective, the door is open to find a solution for everyone.
“For all property owners who are currently excluded from the scheme, there will be a need to assess how many affected properties there are and then, to develop a scheme that would work for them.
“Sinn Féin have a plan and solution to end the crisis in housing.”