Cabinet Committees
Dail Éireann — 2026-09-16
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Peter 'Chap' Cleere (FF), Carlow-Kilkenny

I was very saddened this morning to hear of the very sad and untimely passing of Eamonn Langton. Eamonn was a very successful businessman, a staunch Kilkenny man and a passionate GAA supporter. The Langton name and the Langton establishment are synonymous with everything that is good about Kilkenny. Recently he was made a freeman of the city. It was such a fitting tribute that he was able to be there with all his family and friends. A great Gael passed away this morning. We are thinking of him and all his family at this very sad time. I acknowledge that the Taoiseach wrote him a letter after he was made a freeman of the city. That was the last time I spoke to him and he was so appreciative of that formal acknowledgement of his contribution from the Taoiseach and leader of the country.
I will raise the issue of the vacant and derelict property grant. It is a very successful grant, which provides between €50,000 and €70,000 every year. There have been 20,000 applications nationally, with about €346 million paid out, so it is a really effective scheme we have going. About €3 million has been paid out in full in Carlow for 184 applications and for about 440 applications in Kilkenny with €9 million paid out. I have two asks here, which would be great. When it was originally introduced in 2022, the scheme paid €30,000 for a vacant property and €50,000 for a derelict one. This was increased in 2023 to €50,000 for a vacant property and €70,000 for a derelict property. Will the Government consider increasing that in the upcoming budget to significantly higher levels, considering the increased expenses and costs in construction at the moment? Also, is it possible from a technical perspective to introduce a partial drawdown stage? At the moment, people can only draw down the funding once the works are completed in full. Given the amount of funding involved, it would be appropriate if, for example, there were a possibility halfway through that people could draw down a certain portion of the funding to ease the challenges that many families and individuals are facing when availing of these grants.

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Record URI: https://data.oireachtas.ie/akn/ie/debateRecord/dail/2026-09-16/debate/main
Retrieved: 2026-09-28T05:50:48+00:00
Sitting date: 2026-09-16