We spoke here before during the introduction of our vacancy and dereliction Bill, and thankfully, some of the measures - quite a lot of the measures - outlined in our cross-party Bill have been adopted. I welcome the introduction of the grant schemes in the Department for living above the shop. It is something I feel very strongly about as I travel around the country and see the potential and the lights off in so many above-shop premises in our villages, towns and cities.

This grant scheme also adds to a suite of measures and supports for the renovation and restoration of older and historic buildings in our villages, towns and city centres. There is no doubt in my mind that these measures should have been embedded from the start in housing policy. They should have been core to it, we should have been looking to see what we have and do all in our power to prevent urban sprawl and the loss of good farming land out in the peripheries and into the countryside.

The Government put a timed delay on our cross-party group vacancy and dereliction Bill and a similar Bill ,which had been brought forward by the Green Party when we were in government, but I appreciate many of these measures have been introduced and it is very welcome to see that happen. We do not care who brings them in; I said that to the Minister of State the day we were here. They are an essential component that is missing to help animate and scale-up the restoration and renovation of these incredible buildings.

A measure that is one of the missing pieces of the jigsaw has been sought for many years by the Irish Green Building Council and the Vacant to Vibrant Building Alliance, which I think the Minister of State might have met, as well as by the architect and conservation profession more generally, namely, the establishment of a one-stop shop in every local authority to help project developers navigate their way through the legislative planning, regulatory and incentive matrix. This would ensure our councils become an enabling force to get these wonderful built heritage elements back into to productive use, to get families back living in our town centres and to help uplift those towns commercially and socially.

Since the establishment of the town centre first principles in 2021, which was based on a Scottish initiative, a suite of new roles has come into our local government system, such as architectural conservation officers, town centre first officers and vacancy officers. However, project proposers often find it tricky, to say the least, to navigate the system and there are varying interpretations from county to county regarding fire and access regulations, sometimes at the behest of the fire officer. Sometimes they have different interpretations of what can and cannot be done to a building. By establishing a network of one-stop-shops across the local government system, we can overcome and develop a consistency of approach and application, share best practice and, importantly, move these projects along.

There is also concern within the sector more widely that there is a shortage of relevant conservation skills, such as joinery, masonry and glazing, but also conservation architects. I am concerned that we may lose vernacular features on older buildings and building fabric that could be saved and, in the case of older shops and buildings, the loss of features such as shopfronts, sash windows, guttering and other features that are intrinsic to Irish town centres. The good grant schemes in the Minister of State's Department like the historic structures fund and built heritage investment schemes help in that regard. There is also a technical guidance document for restoration which was developed by the national built heritage service, which is most welcome.

I ask the Minister of State to give consideration to engaging with the CCMA, LGMA, local authority members and the Heritage Council to see if it is possible for us to establish these one-stop shops. As I said, we have a wide array of supports there and funding mechanisms are now in place but the missing piece of the jigsaw is the establishment of one-stop shops in our local authorities.

I thank the Senator for raising this important matter and giving me an opportunity to update the House. I assure the Senator that the Government absolutely recognises the importance of tackling vacancy and dereliction and we continue to be committed to addressing these issues through a range of measures and with the support of all key stakeholders, including our local authorities.

In particular, the Government has invested in the provision of dedicated vacant homes officers and town regeneration officers, working with local authorities specifically on vacancy and dereliction-related issues locally. These staff operate in conjunction with wider local authority teams that place an emphasis on town regeneration and bringing under-utilised buildings back into use. Networking and best practice initiatives for these staff and teams are provided my Department and the national town centre first office to support more effective service provision at a local level for citizens.

These local authority staff are key to enabling the public to access a wide range of funding streams now available in tackling vacancy and dereliction, such as the vacant property refurbishment grant, which provides up to €50,000 for the refurbishment of vacant properties for use as homes and up to €70,000 where the property is derelict.

This scheme has recently been expanded with a new vacant above-the-shop grant of up to €135,000 to support the bringing of above-the-shop vacant spaces into residential units where a commercial element is remaining at ground-floor level. An expert advice grant of up to €5,000 is also now available towards professional advice on the conversion of such former commercial floor spaces into residential units. That element - the €5,000 grant - speaks a lot to what the Senator has raised in regard to having the expert advice to ensure we are being delicate with these buildings in bringing them back into productive use. As the Senator rightly pointed out, we have a resource difficulty in expertise, and the thought within the Department is that this grant allows the person who is doing it the flexibility to be able to get that advice on board as they need it.

Support is also being provided through call 3 of the urban regeneration and development fund, URDF, which consists of a €150 million revolving fund for our local authorities to acquire vacant or derelict properties and sites for reuse or sale. The fund is replenished from the proceeds received from the sale or reuse of properties, allowing a rolling fund for local authorities to tackle vacancy and dereliction.

We also have a compulsory purchase order, CPO, activation programme, which was launched by my Department in April 2023. This programme supports a proactive and systematic approach by local authorities to the reuse of vacant and derelict properties. It also includes guidance for local authorities to actively use their legislative powers, including under the Derelict Sites Act, to acquire vacant and derelict properties and to use CPO powers where engagement with the owners has been unsuccessful. Some local authorities are doing this to great effect, while other local authorities certainly need to step up their game in this space. That is one of the areas I focus on when I visit local authorities across the country.

There are obviously a few other elements such as the town centre first heritage revival scheme, THRIVE, and the commercial-to-residential exemption from planning, which I extended before Christmas up to the end of 2028. The latest data on that indicate that 3,500 homes up to the end of 2024 have been created with that exemption in place. I am bringing forward further exemptions from planning, all with the goal of streamlining our planning system and removing red tape from it so as to be able to free up planning resources within our local authorities.

Gabhaim buíochas leis an Aire Stáit. I thank him for his comprehensive answer. I appreciate the conservation advice grants. They are very useful but they are very limited to the conservation element of it. That is why I think the one-stop shop, which involves having the interdisciplinary skills within the local authorities, is a really progressive approach. I again ask the Minister of State's Department to perhaps give it consideration. This is about heritage-led regeneration and I know the Department is now working to review and broaden the definition of dereliction. It is really important to get that right as well because we see many property owners making small interventions and then trying to not have properties classified as derelict.

Within the above-the-shop scheme, the idea of removing the element of commercial on the ground floor should be given consideration, given the flux that retail is in currently across the country, to allow premises and particularly small businesses to return those buildings to full occupancy. It has to be given consideration, given the state of retail in the country at the minute. Again, I ask the Minister of State to give consideration to the one-stop shop idea.

There are obviously pros and cons to what the Senator is suggesting in respect of removing commercial at ground-floor level. The commercial-to-residential exemption from planning does provide for that but the vacant above-the-shop grant does exactly that by providing for residential units above a commercial unit.

Sure.

That is what we are supporting from a Government perspective. We want the ground-floor retail to remain while utilising that underutilised space above the shop. It is a very significant intervention by the Government to provide up to €135,000 in grant support. There are obviously other schemes, like the repair and lease scheme, that have been used to good effect in areas, particularly in my own city and county of Waterford. The Senator mentioned the derelict property tax, which is progressing with the Tánaiste and Minister for Finance, Deputy Simon Harris. That is a particular focus for us because we now have many carrots across a whole suite of measures. I have said before in this House and the Dáil Chamber that my message is very clear to anybody who is sitting on vacant and derelict properties at a time of such housing need out there: it is simply unacceptable, and if you are not going to use the measures that have been introduced by the Government, then the stick is coming with the derelict property tax.