Thousands of council houses lying idle despite accommodation crisis

Over 3,500 council houses lay empty at the end of June, it has been confirmed. 

There are currently 95,000 people on the council waiting lists across the country. 

RTE's Morning Ireland heard that there are 3,544 houses currently vacant which are owned by city and county councils at the end of June. 

The figures were released following a Freedom of Information request from Aontú leader, Deputy Peader Tobin. 

"This is an incredible situation that in the jaws of a national emergency, in terms of housing, that we have well over 3,000 local authority homes lying idle," Deputy Tobin said. 

He added that the State has over 12,000 people living in emergency homeless accommodation. 

"Half of those people could be accommodated by local authority homes that the State already owns," he said. 

"The State is failing significantly in terms of re-renting and turning around these empty council houses," Mr Toibin said. 

There are systemic problems in turning around those houses, Deputy Tobin said. He urged the Minister for Housing Darragh O'Brien to step in and solve the problem. 

"We have an incredible situation where the State is paying hundreds of millions of Euros on temporary accommodation for people when mothers, fathers and children can actually have their own bedrooms, their own front doors and their own kitchens rather than living in hotels and temporary accommodation," Deputy Tobin told Morning Ireland. 

In response, the Department of Housing said: "The most recent NOAC (The National Oversight and Audit Commission) report shows that the turnaround time for social homes in some counties has improved significantly".