In profile: Oireachtas Joint Committee on Housing, Local Government and Heritage

Established in May 2025, the Committee on Housing, Local Government and Heritage is tasked with shadowing the work of the Department of Housing, Local Government and Heritage.

Comprising nine teachtaí dála and five seanadóirí, the Joint Committee on Housing, Local Government and Heritage of the 34th Dáil and 27th Seanad met publicly for the first time on 20 May 2025.

Only a single nomination for the committee’s leas-chathaoirleach was received – though Deputy Rory Hearne had submitted his name after the scheduled deadline – and Séamus McGrath TD was unanimously appointed.

Upon his election, McGrath said: “We all recognise that while this is a broad committee, housing is the number one issue for it and the Government. I want to work with everyone in a fair and balanced way to try to make progress on these issues.”

Earlier in May, Fine Gael’s Micheál Carrigy TD addressed the select committee as its newly appointed cathaoirleach: “The remit of this committee covers one of the most acutely important issues for our country at this moment, that is, housing. While I appreciate the remit of the committee is wider than this and we therefore need balance, we are also in a housing crisis, so there needs to be a significant focus on housing for the term ahead and as long as is required… We have a lot of work to do together, and it is by us all working together that we can make positive changes.”

Suggesting that the housing committee “has worked well when it has worked in a collegiate manner”, Deputy Eoin Ó Broin stated: “When in committee, not unlike how many of us did when we were on councils, when we come together and try to work together to address or resolve the problems we know are out there, the committee can do some very important work. That is always a challenge when we still have to go into the Chamber or out on the airwaves and have our more partisan battles, but I have had a lot of very good experiences in this committee previously.”

The joint committee is tasked with:

• scrutiny of EU legislative proposals;
• engagement with ministers;
• engagement on statutory departmental scrutiny reports;
• engagement with European bodies;
• consideration of policy areas within its terms of reference;
• pre-legislative scrutiny and consideration of post-enactment report; and
• engagement with chairpersons designate of bodies or agencies under the aegis of DHLGH.

Work programme 2025

Agreed on 10 June 2025, the Joint Committee on Housing, Local Government and Heritage Work programme covers the period from then until December 2025.

Ahad of the Dáil summer recess, the joint committee examined several policy areas, including the Report of The Housing Commission, challenges facing housing delivery, an update on Housing for All, and tackling homelessness.

The joint committee will prioritise 13 policy areas during the remainder of 2025:

1. social housing;
2. housing delivery;
3. homelessness;
4. affordable housing and cost rental;
5. vacancy and dereliction;
6. local government reform;
7. defective concrete block scheme;
8. post-legislative scrutiny of the Planning and Development Act 2024;
9. housing provision;
10. low carbon housing
11. the rental sector;
12. land activation; and
13. heritage.

Key figures:

Cathaoirleach: Micheál Carrigy TD

Leas-chathaoirleach: Séamus McGrath TD

Clerk to the Committee: Daniel Hurley

Press officer: Robert Kennedy-Cochrane