Tiny fraction of empty Laois homes declared officially 'vacant' by council
Just over 2% of Laois homes found to to be empty have been officially declared vacant while while just 12 out of 3,000 empty properties were subject to a levy from the council, according to a new report.
That's one of the findings on Laois in the Annual Overview of the Planning System 2021 published by the Office of the Planning Regulator (OPR) on December 30, 2022.
The report publishes a table which shows that the Central Statistics Office found in the 2016 that there were 3,007 vacant houses and flats in Laois. Their figures exclude holiday homes.
However, the OPR reports that in Laois the number of homes officially logged 56 homes as vacant. The Regulator also says that just 12 properties in Laois had been subject to the Vacant Site Levy at the start of 2021.
Nationally the OPR report says there are 183,312 recorded as vacant by the CSO in 2021. Of these 5,210 have been officially logged as vacant while 313 were subject to a vacancy levy.
The figures published by the OPR are based on Vacant Site Levy (Jan 2021), Vacant Homes Logged (May 2021) and CSO Vacant Houses and Flats (excl. holiday homes) (2016).
The Regulator says just 261 sites were removed from the derelict sites register during 2021 around Ireland.
Commenting generally the OPR report says
"The extent of sites designated as either vacant and or derelict would appear to be very low in comparison to, for
example, the number of vacant dwellings in Ireland recorded by the CSO in the last census.
"At the same time, it must be acknowledged that while the CSO’s criteria for considering a dwelling vacant and the statutory criteria for a given site or lands to be considered as vacant and/ or derelict are very different, there would appear to be very significant potential for local authorities to become more active in the area of tackling dereliction subject, to being sufficiently resourced," says the report.
While core planning functions continue to experience high volumes of activity, the OPR says more is also being asked of local authorities and tackling vacancy and dereliction will be high on the agenda.
"2021 was also a year of very significant activity by local authorities in starting to implement funding streams aimed at securing urban and rural regeneration. However, a critical function to such investment will require concerted action on vacant and derelict buildings," it says.
The regulator's report also says that the Residential Zoned Land Tax will replace the existing Vacant Site Levy (VSL). It says the objective of RZLT is to activate serviced land zoned for residential and mixed-residential use to increase housing supply, including through the regeneration of vacant and idle lands in urban locations. It will come into effect from 2024 and will be administered by the Revenue Commissioners rather than by local authorities.
The OPR says the Department of Housing estimates that vacant sites were liable to the 7% levy in 2021 amounting to €9.96m in 2021 in respect of 2020 and a levy of €7.25m in 2022 in respect of 2021.
The OPR was established in April 2019 on foot of recommendations made by the Tribunal of Inquiry into Certain Planning Matters and Payments (the Mahon Tribunal).
Its purpose is to oversee the continuous enhancement of Ireland’s planning process and its outcomes by driving the co-ordination of planning policy implementation across national, regional and local levels, building a stronger knowledge base and ensuring regular reviews of the performance of planning authorities and An Bord Pleanála.