Minister for Disabilities and Fianna Fáil TD for Galway East, Anne Rabbitte, has aired her disappointment over Galway County Council’s failure to draw down any exchequer funding for housing adaptation grants so far this year.
The revelation comes after Minister Rabbitte was provided data by the Minister for Housing, which shows that as of 30th June 2021 (the latest date available). The data shows that Galway County Council is the only Council in the country to draw down zero monies for the popular grant.
Minister Rabbitte commented:
I’m simply stunned to see that Galway County Council is the only Council in the country to so far draw down no funding for housing adaptation grants. It’s simply shocking and, to me, is letting the people of county Galway down.
You have Councils across the country drawing down hundreds of thousands of euro, and in some cases millions, to provide to older people and people with a disability who are seeking to make adaptations to their home. I simply cannot fathom why Galway County Council appear to be dragging their heels on such applications. I was expecting the figure to be low but not zero. I’m dumbfounded.
My office is inundated with queries about applying for this grant so I cannot accept that there isn’t enough interest and I know from seeing the applications myself, many of these people are entitled to the funding.
A total of €75 million is available nationally in 2021 for the Housing Adaptation Grants with local authorities funding 20% of the overall budget from their own resources and the balance of 80% funded by the exchequer. I hope by highlighting this, we may see movement on the processing of the grants by Galway County Council,
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