The housing crisis is holding Ireland back and a "can-do" Covidstyle response needs to be adopted, the Taoiseach has declared.
Leo Varadkar has indicated he plans to override State aid rules and even the Constitution in a bid to "turn the corner" on the housing shortage.
For the first time, Mr Varadkar has accepted that "permanent housing solutions" are going to be required to help house close to 70,000 Ukrainian refugees who have already arrived in the country. This indicates that the scale of the housing crisis is more acute than previously believed.
The Fine Gael leader said: "Sometimes in government we're too willing to say that things can't be done, because of public finances, because of State aid rules, or because of something else, I'm not willing to accept that.
"We need to turn the corner on housing, it is an emergency, it's affecting people in so many different ways. It's holding us back as a country, and it's causing intergenerational division that I don't like to see. So, it's really going to be a case of let's do everything, unless there's a really good reason as to why we can't."
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The Taoiseach said that next year the Government needs to move from an emergency and humanitarian response to "more permanent housing solutions".
"That's what we're going to do in the next couple of months," he said. "We have to look at in the round. There are people here, for example, 5,000 people still living in direct provision who have status; it would be good if we could find a way to accommodate them to free up those places.
"And then, also, there are a lot of Irish people, Irish citizens and EU citizens that are on housing lists for a very long time. So we need to look at that in the round and make sure that we're fair to everyone."
He added that there are many different ways of increasing supply. "We have a lot of levers; we just need to make sure that we use the right ones," he said. "Obviously, there's financial levers, grants, Government spending, Government investment, also things that could be done on the tax side, for example, that we need to examine. There's legislative levers then as well, so, for example, planning law reform, to make sure that things get through planning permissions quickly."
Mr Varadkar also said the Government intends to use a "carrot and stick" approach with schemes such as the Croí Cónaithe scheme and zoned land tax to entice private developers to build new homes. The Croí Cónaithe fund aims to bridge the gap between the cost of building apartments and the sale price, when the cost is more than the sale price.
Asked whether he intends to increase the zoned land tax, which is currently set at 3% of the market value of the land, Mr Varadkar said there was no plan to do so at present, but that when it comes to housing, "absolutely everything has to be on the table and properly considered".
Mr Varadkar added that the Land Development Agency could play a bigger role in home delivery. "The Land Development Agency can pre-purchase apartments and homes for social and affordable housing that can be bankable and can help developers build," he said.
The Croí Cónaithe scheme, yet to be administered, is one option that could be heavily utilised by the Government.
Mr Varadkar said the scheme will "help" but that developers would need to prove there is a viability issue. "A lot of builders will say to us that they're not able to proceed with apartment developments in particular that they have permission for because it's not financially viable," he said. "I'm not just going to take that as the truth, you know, we need to examine that and make sure that that is the truth. But if it is the truth then Government needs to step in."
He added: "I often say that there are I think about 70,000 planning permissions out there for new homes, mostly apartments, but they're not activated or not being built, and I want to see them under construction."
The Taoiseach said that the new Residential Zoned Land Tax (RZLT) will help unlock new land. Land that is zoned for residential development and has been serviced after January 1, 2022 will be liable for the RZLT at 3% of its market value, with the first payments being made in 2024.
"The zoned land tax is part of that [stimulating housing]. Saying to people who have land that can be developed that it's not an asset... this is the housing crisis and either get under way building it or developing on it or seek for it to be dezoned," Mr Varadkar said.
The Taoiseach said that the State's Ukraine response would pivot from being a humanitarian to a housing response.
He said: "When it comes to people who come from Ukraine - 60,000-70,000 here already, there are going to be more - I think a lot of them are going to stay, they're going to be here for the mediumto-long term. And we will need to move to an approach next year that isn't just about an emergency response, humanitarian responses, but is more about permanent housing solutions. And that's what we're going to do in the next couple of months."
The Government is already struggling to meet its current Housing for All targets, which are based on a housing need of 33,000 homes per annum. This newspaper previously revealed internal Department of Housing records showing that, in reality, 42,000 homes are needed annually.
