Regional Housing Strategy

According to the Planning and Development Act 2000 every Local Authority must prepare a Housing Strategy and include in it their Development Plan. The strategy shall relate to the duration of the Development Plan or the remaining duration of a plan. The Minister may direct that two or more authorities produce a joint strategy.

The strategy shall make an estimate of need for all housing including social and affordable housing.

Inter alia a housing strategy shall take into account the existing and likely future need for housing, the need to ensure that housing is available for persons who have different levels of income and the need to counteract undue segregation in housing between persons of different social backgrounds.

A Housing Strategy shall provide that as a general policy a specified percentage, not being more than 20%, of the land zoned for residential use, or for a mixture of residential and other uses, shall be reserved for the provision of social and affordable housing.

 

In order to counteract undue segregation in housing between persons of different social backgrounds, a planning authority may indicate in respect of any area that there is either no requirement for social and affordable housing or that a lower percentage than the overall may be required.

There can be only one strategy per planning authority even though that strategy may be a joint strategy amongst several authorities. There cannot be separate strategies for different parts of a planning authority area although a single strategy can have different objectives for different parts of that area requiring varying proportions of social and affordable housing and such proportions may be determined in such a manner as to avoid undue social segregation.

The Joint Strategy should have regard to relevant policies including the following:

Regional Level -