Council considering allowing single people to apply for 2-bed accommodation

A Nenagh Councillor is calling on the members of Housing Strategic Policy Committee to vote in favour of changes to social housing applications.

Seamie Morris says he has had a number of people make contact with him in relation to what he describes as a discriminatory practice whereby people seeking a one bedroom flat were precluded for applying for two bedroom flats.

Following lobbying by Councillor Morris the local authority is now putting recommendations to the Housing SPC to change this so that approved 1 bed applicants can submit expressions of interest for 2 bed properties.

“I’ve had a number of 1-bed applicants on to me over the last 5 or 6 months stating that they had literally been locked out of being able to apply for 2-bedroom residences.

“The problem was that there isn’t enough 1-bedroom so they were literally locked out of the system. So I got onto the Council a few months ago and asked them would they change this and they’re looking at it at the moment and they’re going to put it to the SPC to be able to change that.”

A significant number of people who had missed out on qualifying for Social Housing in Tipperary because they were over the income threshold have been contacted by the County Council.

It follows the €5,000 increase in the limits which the Government announced recently.

Councillor Seamie Morris had called on the council to review people who had previously come in just above the limits which he says has resulted in good news for some applicants.

“They have done a review and they’ve written to 152 people who had failed to squeeze in under the old income limits but now come in under the new income limits. They’ve contacted these people to see if they now want to go on the housing list.”