Reforming Local Authority Housing Management: The Case of Tenant Participation in Estate Management

For most of the period since the tenure was founded in the late 19 th century, the manage ment of local authority housing has been neglected by both central and local government. From the perspective of the former, new house building rather than management, has traditionally been the overriding concern. This attitude is not surprising in view of Ireland’s housing conditions which, until recent years, have compared unfavourably to other European Union (EU) countries both in terms of housing standards and number of dwellings per head (European Union, 2002). Nor is it atypical in the wider Europ ean context where central government influence on social housing has traditionally been exercised mainly by means of capital contributions to building costs, which has limited its control over and interest in housing management (Cole and Furbey, 1994). Ho wever, Ireland is unusual in the extent to which the main providers of social housing, have devoted scant attention to its management. This oversight on the part of local authorities is linked to the introduction of the tenant purchase schemes in the 1930 s in rural areas and the 1960s in urban areas (Fahey, 1998b). The high rate of privatisation required very limited management capacity from housing departments, whose responsibilities have traditionally not stretched far beyond allocating new dwellings an d collecting the rent for the couple of years before tenants exercise their right to buy (O’Connell, 1999).