The Government is being urged to introduce a vacant homes tax.

Sinn Fein made the call and said schemes that the government has introduced to tackle homelessness are underfunded.

The party's Housing spokesperson Eoin Ó Broin TD said: "The schemes the government has introduced including, repair and lease, buy and renew and the Housing Agency fund are underfunded and the targets are far too low.

"Only 70 homes were delivered under Buy & Renew in 2017.

"Only nine homes were delivered and tenanted via three local authorities under Repair and Lease in 2017.

"Only 382 homes acquired by the Housing Agency out of 1,800 offered.

-- Advertisement --

"The government should aim to return to active use a minimum of 20% of the current vacant stock (36,000 units) over six years delivering an average of 6000 units per year.

"Sinn Féin published a Vacant Homes strategy last summer that contained a number of key recommendations that if implemented would help return vacant homes back to use.

"Local councils need ambitious targets coupled with adequate funding to bring vacant homes back into use including greater use of CPOs if necessary.

"Every local authority should have a dedicated vacant homes officer and should have a register of properties that have been vacant for six months or more.

"To help tackle the long term council voids, the government should prioritise the implementation of Choice Based Letting in all local authorities to ensure that all short term voids are tenanted as speedily as possible.

"The government should introduce a vacant homes tax aimed at properties vacant more than six months within DED's or LEA's determined by the Local Authorities as having a high level of housing need and a high level of vacancy. Exemptions would be applied to certain categories of homes including homes in probate or in the fair deal scheme."

(CD/MH)