{"id":565634,"date":"2026-07-24T08:36:25","date_gmt":"2026-07-24T08:36:25","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/565634\/"},"modified":"2026-07-24T08:36:25","modified_gmt":"2026-07-24T08:36:25","slug":"state-cannot-provide-every-home-minister-says-cultural-change-needed-on-housing-the-irish-times","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/565634\/","title":{"rendered":"State \u2018cannot provide every home\u2019: Minister says cultural change needed on housing \u2013 The Irish Times"},"content":{"rendered":"

Minister for Housing James Browne<\/a> has all but ruled out extending a VAT cut on apartment buildings to include all new-build homes in this year\u2019s budget.<\/p>\n

The Government cut VAT on apartment building in its budget last October to make such properties more affordable by easing building costs. <\/p>\n

In a budget submission to Minister for Finance Simon Harris<\/a>, lobby group Irish Institutional Property<\/a> (IIP) said the reduced 9 per cent VAT rate should apply to all home building, not just to apartment construction.<\/p>\n

The IIP said a wider VAT reduction in the upcoming budget would improve the viability of housing schemes and \u201creduce the cost passed through sale prices and rents\u201d.<\/p>\n

However, Browne told reporters on Wednesday he does not believe an extension of the cut would be \u201cmeritable\u201d, but pledged he will keep \u201ceverything under close scrutiny\u201d. <\/p>\n

Browne said the Government has done \u201can awful lot\u201d in the past 18 months to help the viability of apartment and housing construction.<\/p>\n

He acknowledged the war in the Middle East is causing issues for house building and inflating input costs. <\/p>\n

The Minister also said there needs to be a \u201ccultural change\u201d regarding the State\u2019s role in housing.<\/p>\n

Delivering social and affordable homes is important, he said, but the Government must also facilitate the delivery of private homes because the State \u201ccannot provide every home that everybody needs\u201d.<\/p>\n

He also said allowing the State\u2019s affordable-housing agency to build more homes for private sale will lead to an increase in social and affordable housing.<\/p>\n

He added that income generated from the sale of private homes by the Land Development Agency<\/a> (LDA) will be quickly \u201crecycled\u201d to provide more housing for social tenants and affordable purchasers.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think this is an appropriate measure. I think it will lead to even more social and affordable homes being delivered,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Browne said people whose incomes are above the thresholds for affordable purchase or cost-rental homes are \u201ceffectively locked out\u201d from being able to buy a home delivered by the State. He said this should not be the case.<\/p>\n

Sites with mixed tenures work \u201cbetter for everybody\u201d living there, he said, adding the proposal is to be included in planned legislation to expand the scope of the LDA to assist in the delivery of housing.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Minister for Housing James Browne has all but ruled out extending a VAT cut on apartment buildings to…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":565635,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[72,3662,61,60,236752,7116,11595],"class_list":["post-565634","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-business","tag-business","tag-housing-crisis","tag-ie","tag-ireland","tag-irish-institutional-property-iip","tag-james-browne","tag-land-development-agency"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/565634","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=565634"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/565634\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/565635"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=565634"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=565634"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=565634"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}