Dáil Éireann debate -
Tuesday, 14 Jun 2016

Vol. 913 No. 1

Rent Certainty Bill 2016: Second Stage [Private Members]

Deputy Eoin Ó Broin

I move: "That the Bill be now read a Second Time."

The amount of €17,448 is the current cost per year of renting an average family home in Dublin city. Outside this city in the rest of the State, the average cost of renting per year is €8,772. A middle income working family paying this level of rent simply would not be able to afford to save for a deposit to purchase a home. A low income working family paying this level of rent would spend as much as 60% of their disposable income on their monthly rent. A family on rent supplement could pay up to €900 per month from an income of less than €1,800. A family on €188 per week jobseeker's allowance in receipt of the housing assistance payment could pay up to €500 a month.

According to the daft.ie rental report published two months ago, rents have risen on average across the State by 9% in the past 12 months. According to the Private Residential Tenancies Board report published last week, in parts of Galway, Kildare, Meath and Laois, the increase has been between 15% and 19%. In almost every single part of the country rents are spiralling out of control and this is happening at a time when inflation in the economy is virtually at 0%.

The consequences of these rent rises are not trivial. Parents are having to decide between paying rent and paying for other essential household items. In some cases, families are being made homeless because of inability to pay rents or to secure rental accommodation. Out of control rents are having a crushing financial impact on some of the State's poorest households and thousands of children are affected, spending up to two years in some instances in emergency accommodation or living in households with ever deeper levels of income poverty. The scale of this crisis cannot be underestimated and, in Sinn Féin's view, the time for action is now.

We know the causes of the crisis in the private rental sector. For decades, successive Governments have failed to build real social housing. Families who should have been living in council housing were forced into the private rental sector. This pushed up the price of rents for all. Successive Governments also failed to ensure an adequate supply of student accommodation and affordable homes for first-time buyers. Again, tens of thousands of households were forced into the private rental sector, which pushed up rents. An ever-increasing number of home evictions are adding another layer to the housing crisis. As many as 150,000 households are living in the private rental sector when they should be living elsewhere in our housing system. In our view, this is a damning indictment of Government failure on a massive scale.

The Dáil Committee on Housing and Homelessness will report this Friday. It will lay out detailed recommendations on how to address the structural causes of our housing crisis. Hopefully, the Minister, Deputy Coveney, will include all our recommendations in his action plan on housing due later this summer. Many of the recommendations will take some time to implement but in the immediate term measures must be taken to stem the flow of families into homelessness and to relieve the pressure on hard-pressed renting families.

In Sinn Féin's view, rent certainty is key to this. This Bill is very simple in its objective. It seeks to link rent reviews to the consumer price index. It is not rent control. It is not arbitrary. It is in the common good and it is based on principles of social justice. I do not believe there is any constitutional impediment to this measure. The Bill seeks to ensure stability for renters and for landlords. It would prevent volatile shocks in the rental market. If the previous Government had introduced this measure earlier in its term, score of families who are now homeless would still be in their private rented accommodation. Instead, the Minister for Finance, Deputy Michael Noonan, blocked the then Minister, Deputy Alan Kelly, from introducing this measure and matters have got much worse.

In drafting this Bill, I have kept it as simple as possible. It seeks simply to link rent reviews to the consumer price index. Some Deputies may argue that there is a better index to which to link rents. Others may want to see a time limit or periodic reviews built into rent certainty measures and others may want to see reference rents accompanying rent certainty. I and my colleagues on this side of the House are open to persuasion on all of these issues. I would say to those Deputies that if this is what they want, let this Bill pass Second Stage and propose amendments when we come to deal with Committee Stage.

I listened carefully to An Taoiseach earlier today during Leaders' Questions. He said Fine Gael would not support the Bill as it was pre-empting the report of the Dáil Committee on Housing and Homelessness and the Minister, Deputy Coveney's action plan on housing. He did not have the same problem with his colleagues announcing a €200 million local infrastructure housing fund today despite the fact that it is an issue also under consideration in the report of the Committee on Housing and Homelessness to be launched on Friday. An Taoiseach said Sinn Féin's refusal to agree to an adjournment of the debate tonight was playing politics. Let me say very clearly in this House tonight that I doubt the thousands of families struggling with out of control rents would agree.

I also read with interest Deputy Cowen's comments in the media this afternoon. He accused Sinn Féin of trying to gazump and undermine the work of the Dail Committee on Housing and Homelessness. He described our moving of this Bill as "gutter politics". If the Deputy was in the Chamber, I would ask him directly if he really meant to use the term "gutter politics" on such an important issue. Yet like An Taoiseach, Deputy Enda Kenny, Fianna Fáil has a Private Members' motion on housing in the Seanad tomorrow, which makes five specific recommendations, all of which are also matters under consideration by the Committee on Housing and Homelessness. There is no talk of gazumping or undermining the committee there.

During statements on housing in the Dáil last March, Deputy Cowen called for the introduction of rent certainty. Only last Sunday on "The Week in Politics" his colleague, Deputy Sean Fleming, said that "linking rent to inflation needs to happen straight away" to keep families in their homes. Fianna Fáil's refusal to support this Bill is genuinely hard to understand and deeply disappointing. I suspect what is happening here is that Fine Gael remains opposed to rent certainty. Fianna Fail, as part of its agreement with the Government is helping it avoid any embarrassment. Fine Gael and Fianna Fáil are asking us to wait. The Minister, Deputy Coveney, on "Drivetime" this evening suggested that we may return to this issue in the autumn.

Deputy Simon Coveney

I was not on "Drivetime" this evening.

Deputy Eoin Ó Broin

They are asking families at risk of losing their homes and under huge financial strain to wait. In my view, this is simply not acceptable.

Sinn Féin's intention in tabling this Bill is to advance what we believe is a sensible policy that urgently needs to be introduced. I make no apologies for doing that here tonight. The only gazumping going on here is in the private rental sector as desperate families are being forced by Government inaction to outbid each other to put a roof over their heads. The only people being undermined are low and middle income families trapped - again because of Government inaction - in over-priced rental accommodation or, even worse, in inadequate emergency bed and breakfast accommodation and hotels.

The choice before Deputies this evening is very simple. If they are opposed to rent certainty, then they should vote against, or abstain on, this Bill but if they believe that rent certainty has a role to play in tackling the housing and homeless crisis, then they should vote for our Bill and give some hope to the thousands of families who tonight desperately need it.

Deputy Gerry Adams

Ba mhaith liom an Bille seo a mholadh agus buíochas a ghabháil leis an Teachta Ó Broin as ucht é a chur faoi bhráid na Dála. This is an important Bill and I hope the Dáil will agree that it is a component in tackling the unparalleled housing and homelessness crisis prevalent in the State at this time.

If they do not agree to it tonight, or when we vote on it, I hope they will at some time in the future.

This is a very commonsensical Bill which seeks to provide greater protection for both tenants and landlords against volatility in the rental market by linking any increases or decreases in rental value with the CSO's consumer price index. Rents have risen by 10% across the State since this time last year and they continue to rise as the rent certainty measures introduced by the previous Minister, Deputy Alan Kelly, last year have abjectly failed adequately to address the rental crisis. This has all been well documented. The Daft quarterly rental report last month showed that average rents across the State are now more than €1,000 per month, which is an increase of nearly 9%. The Private Residential Tenancies Board quarterly rent index released earlier this month shows that rents across the State are 8.6% higher in the first three months of the year than in the same period last year. Dublin has been particularly affected with average rental prices reaching just short of €1,100 at the end of March. This has had a major knock-on effect on growth in rents outside the capital as people move into north Leinster, including into my own constituency of Louth and east Meath where rents are soaring to unsustainable levels. Both counties have seen the largest rent increases across the State. No category of rental property in County Louth has seen an increase of less than 10% while rents in Meath have risen even higher by almost 15%. These findings were backed up by another report of the Private Residential Tenancies Board which finds that both counties have seen the highest rent increases in the State.

As with other Members, my office deals with the human outworkings of this crisis every day. There are landlords who will not respond to requests for a viewing by those who would need HAP while adults live in overcrowded conditions because they cannot afford to rent. Some of them are in their mid-30s. Families have been given notice to vacate homes, cannot find other accommodation and are faced with homelessness. All of this is a direct by-product of the fact that it is now more expensive to rent a home in Dublin than it was during the boom in 2007.

We need solutions and, as legislators, we have a responsibility to find them. This Bill is a start. There is no logic to Fianna Fáil not supporting this Bill. Rent control provides certainty for both the landlord and the tenant and it is used in many other European Union member states as a practical solution to tackle out of control rent increases and decreases. The Bill would allow the same for citizens of the State, many of whom simply cannot afford to pay these rents. This has been compounded by the lack of social housing construction as well as a lack of affordable housing which has kept more people in the private rented sector. All of these issues must be resolved. This Bill is a positive step in that direction.

I appeal to all Members to support the Bill, in particular Fianna Fáil Members. The soldiers of destiny come here every day. They rail against something the Government has or has not done in line with popular opinion and then they vote with the Government or in its interests in the lobbies. It is an absurd position. Fianna Fáil Members are masters at playing this kind of politics and their new politics looks very like old politics to me. The Fianna Fáil Party is backing up Fine Gael in pursuit of a bad policy agenda which is actively creating greater stress and unfairness in the lives of citizens. Fianna Fáil cannot distance itself from that and say it is facilitating. It is as complicit in the decisions and failures of this Government as Fine Gael and the smattering of Independents propping it up.

Ba mhaith liom an Bille seo a mholadh os comhair na Dála. Iarraim ar achan Teachta ó gach pháirtí tacaíocht a thabhairt dó.

Deputy Denise Mitchell

In respect of the current situation in housing, Threshold has said that without longer term rent certainty, tenants will continue to face the risk of homelessness due to unaffordable rent increases. This emphasises the nature of the problem in the State. Rent certainty can protect against homelessness as it gives certainty to the tenants and a safety net against one of the most serious deprivations in life, which is to lose one's home. Rent is one of the major outgoings of any household. As such, it governs other payments and so much of people's daily living expenses. We have seen a rise in rents with zero protection for tenants. The Bill put forward by Sinn Féin provides against gross, inconsistent and erratic variations in individual rents. We are seeing directly on the ground the consequences of large rises in rents faced by our constituents and the impact they have on people's lives. In north County Dublin, taking in my own constituency of Dublin Bay North, rents have risen at an average rate of 10.2% compared to the same period last year. With the rise in property prices and the shortage of social housing, people are left with only one option, which is to rent. They are being placed at the whim of the market and private landlords. If rents rise suddenly and substantially, where are people to turn? This has forced many of our people into homelessness.

The Bill can provide families with a degree of certainty in regard to the very basic matters of a roof over their heads and their weekly incomes. What is the purpose of a Government if not to ensure that it looks after the needs of its citizens? A starting point should be the very basic need for housing assistance and creating stability in the market for the protection of citizens.

Deputy Seán Crowe

People do not need me to tell them all about the housing crisis. One only has to walk out the gates of Leinster House to see people sleeping in doorways, trying to stay warm and dry. I had a mother of six children in my constituency office just this week, one of whom is seriously ill. She has been living in a bed and breakfast establishment for the last 12 months and has been told by South Dublin County Council that it will be at least six more months before she will get any offer at all. That is the context for tonight's Bill. The Bill will not end our housing crisis but it is a significant and essential part of the housing conundrum.

The Sinn Féin Rent Certainty Bill 2016 would, if enacted, provide greater protection for both tenants and landlords from volatility in the rental market as it will link any rent increases or decreases to the consumer price index. This will prevent dramatic increases or decreases in average rents, which now stand at more than €1,000 per month. The lack of real social housing units has created a deficit in supply which has pushed more and more families into the private rented sector on which other speakers have commented. The inaction of successive Governments has created the perfect storm with longer waiting lists, more people losing their homes and no new social housing units becoming available, certainly in the short term. This has been coupled with a lack of affordable housing in the private rented market, especially in Dublin, which has kept more people trapped in the rented sector. For many, rents are now unaffordable. More low-income families are being pushed into homelessness as rent supplement and HAP levels fail to keep up with rising rent levels. Our Bill will help to achieve rent certainty, allowing renters to plan and bring greater stability to their lives and those of their families. Why would anybody oppose this Bill?

Minister for the Environment, Community and Local Government (Deputy Simon Coveney)

The Government recognises the pressures tenants are under due to rent increases.

No one political party has a monopoly on compassion or concern in that regard. There is some merit in this Bill in the context of the broader debate on the rental market. However, having regard to the all-party report of the Committee on Housing and Homelessness to be published later this week and the Government's action plan for housing, which is due next month, supporting the Bill's passage through Second Stage now would be premature. For this reason, if Sinn Féin chose to adjourn the debate tonight, I would happily facilitate that and pick up the debate at a later stage when we would have an opportunity for a more informed discussion.

I was appointed as Minister with specific responsibility for housing, planning and local government to focus intensively on the challenge of tackling the housing crisis. I have been tasked with preparing an action plan for housing within the Government's first 100 days, working with Government colleagues, Oireachtas colleagues and key stakeholders. This plan must map out a vision for the evolution of the housing sector over the coming years, including the rental sector in which one fifth of the population now resides. The rental sector has faced considerable pressures in recent years and continues to suffer from an acute supply challenge, which is placing many families under severe pressure and, in extreme cases, at risk of homelessness.

A strong and viable private rental sector can play an important role in the housing market and the wider economy. It can provide a housing option for those who either cannot or choose not to enter the owner-occupied market but who still have sufficient means to meet their own accommodation needs. It can provide a housing option to meet rising demand and can promote flexibility and better alignment to a more mobile labour market, making it easier for individuals and families to pursue job opportunities or adapt their accommodation to changing family circumstances. It can also reduce the macroeconomic risks of an over-reliance on home ownership. In the past decade, we have seen examples of states with relatively large private rental sectors, such as Germany and Switzerland, being better insulated against housing booms that states with smaller rented sectors, such as Ireland and Spain, suffered.

The rental sector has traditionally been regarded as a transitional one in which households either wait while saving to buy their own homes or trying to access permanent social housing. It has been perceived as a stopover, not a destination of choice, but this traditional picture is changing. The rental sector has doubled in size in the past two decades. Almost one fifth of the population now lives therein. Growth in the sector has been driven by a range of factors, including a reducing reliance on home ownership as a tenure of choice and demographic influences, such as immigration from the EU and decreasing household sizes. It has also been influenced by a contribution made by the rental sector on delivering social housing supports for low-income households through the rental accommodation scheme, the social housing leasing initiative and, more recently, the housing assistance payment, HAP. While I favour a dramatic increase in social housing stock, the private rental sector will continue to play an important role in the immediate term while we try to increase stock levels.

Notwithstanding this, the rental sector is not yet on a truly viable or sustainable path. Severe supply pressures, rising rents, security of tenure issues, limited but nonetheless unacceptable examples of poor accommodation and a shortage of professional institutional landlords are impediments to delivering on a strong, stable and modern rental sector that offers real choice for individuals and households while contributing to economic growth.

Regarding rent levels, much has been done through last November's rent certainty and supply package, which introduced important amendments to the Residential Tenancies (Amendment) Act 2015. The new rules mean that the minimum period between rent reviews for tenancies has increased from 12 months to 24 months. This will apply for a four-year period until 2019. In addition, the minimum notice period for new rent has increased from 28 days to 90 days, and longer notice periods for the termination of long-term tenancies have been introduced. I accept that these measures are not enough and that we must do more, but we must undergo a process before the right decisions can be guaranteed.

While I appreciate the motivation behind Deputy Ó Broin's Bill, the proposal to tie rents strictly to the consumer price index, CPI, would break the link with the fundamental mechanism for determining rent under the Act, which is prevailing market rents. On the face of it, CPI-linked rent regulation looks attractive, particularly for tenants, but there are issues that need to be considered carefully. For example, a properly functioning rental market needs to offer something for landlords as well as tenants. Saying this might not be popular but without them, we do not get the supply that we need. With current inflation levels running at close to zero, a rent linked to the CPI would be a disincentive to future investment in the market. It could even force existing suppliers to exit the market, exacerbating an already acute supply shortage. Moreover, where rent regulation is too strong, it can lead to market segmentation by creating lock-in effects, black market distortions and supply fall-off. We all know the stories of rent top-ups being paid under the table so that people can stay in their premises. We must not facilitate the continuation of that practice.

In limiting rent reviews to every two years, the Government decided on an approach that would bring increased stability and predictability for tenants without changing the fundamental mechanism for the setting and reviewing of rent as laid down in the 2004 Act. Recent data from the Residential Tenancies Board, RTB, index appear to show that these changes are beginning to have some effect, with the rate of rent increases moderating in Dublin and nationally in the first quarter of this year. However, I fully support the view that more is to be done if we are to allow the sector to evolve into a mature and stable one in which there is a true balance between the rights and responsibilities of landlords and tenants. While the most recent data provide some encouragement, the sector remains fragile and unbalanced, with rents continuing to rise at unsustainable levels. However, we must avoid taking actions that could further destabilise it, contribute to a withdrawal of supply or discourage future investment.

The key to addressing rising rents in the medium to long term is through a dramatic increase in housing supply. Last year, we effectively built approximately one third of what we needed to build. The figure was far less over the past decade. Accelerating the supply of housing is a priority for the Government. Accordingly, a key priority for the programme for Government is the preparation and publication of an action plan for housing. That plan is being drafted with the input from a number of key Departments and will draw on the work of the special Oireachtas Committee on Housing and Homelessness, the report on which I look forward to considering and which I understand we will have by the weekend.

The programme for Government contains a specific commitment to reviewing the regulatory regime for the rental sector in order to ensure that an appropriate balance is struck between the rights, interests and responsibilities of tenants and landlords and between the need to ensure that we continue to get increased supply while helping people to stay in their homes regardless of whether they rent or own them. The forthcoming action plan on housing will set out a detailed timeline for the delivery of this commitment. We are committed to publishing a paper and a set of actions in the autumn on putting in place a more sustainable rental sector.

It is primarily for this reason that supporting the Bill would be premature from our perspective. I want the opportunity to be able to read and discuss in detail the work of the Oireachtas committee, to put our action plan for housing in place next month, to listen to all of the stakeholders involved and to work with many Deputies on putting as complete a response as we can manage in place so as to provide more certainty around rent, security of tenure and so on for tenants while hearing what landlords have to say on how not to undermine supply fundamentally. These are not unreasonable requests. We would have been willing to allow this legislation to continue to be discussed by adjourning the debate at the end of today's two hours as opposed to forcing a vote this week. If a vote is forced, however, it is too early to support the legislation that has been proposed by Sinn Féin.

Deputy Barry Cowen

We welcome the opportunity to speak on the Bill. Somebody asked me in the past hour or two in the corridor how the Government is progressing and about the potential of it or this Dáil to be a success. We have to reserve judgment regarding the way business is being and is about to be done and the effect it can have on those who gave us the privilege of being here and who seek to resolve many of the issues we were elected to address. We are in a new space and new circumstances, and there is a new dynamic. As we all know, there is a considerable disparity in terms of representation in the Dáil. Undoubtedly, business will be done in new ways, and there will be new rules and methods. They are not laid down in stone, but people must be cognisant of them and of the way in which one can hope to effect the sort of change we want to see. My party did not win enough seats to lead the Government. It did not win enough votes in the vote for Taoiseach to lead the Government. Having failed on both of those counts, we still believed there was an onus on us to act responsibly as republicans and democrats and to allow the people an opportunity to form a Government from the existing configuration. We sought to facilitate the formation of a Government, with certain provisos.

We know and accept that, undoubtedly, the greatest challenge facing the State, the economy and society is in the area of housing. There is a chronic set of circumstances, a crisis and an emergency. I acknowledge the good faith and intentions of members of Sinn Féin who initially proposed the setting up of a special housing committee during the period between the election and the formation of the Government. It went somewhat beyond that, and a date was proposed. I acknowledged, welcomed and supported the proposal. A great effort has been made by all Members, of all parties and none, to consult the stakeholders and all concerned in the public, private and voluntary sectors who are working at the coalface, to seek to achieve a consensus among the disparate representatives, to make honest, forthright recommendations, and to acknowledge that the conventional processes and ways in which housing was funded need to be addressed. There are many worthwhile, credible recommendations that will emanate from the committee. I congratulate its chairman, Deputy John Curran, on the manner in which he conducted its affairs. I congratulate all the members, the staff and the executive who assisted in the provision of the report to be produced next Friday. The report will seek to address the provision of housing by the public and private sectors. It will seek to address mortgage distress, mortgage difficulties and the issues in the rental sector. It will seek to provide solutions that can be applied by local authorities and approved housing bodies, and also by colleges in respect of the provision of accommodation on their campuses. It will address affordability for many professionals and others who can no longer afford accommodation that may be provided in larger cities and towns. Companies such as Google can provide many top-class jobs but, as good as those jobs are, as good as the qualifications of those who acquire those jobs are and as good as the pay might be, the employees still cannot aspire to own their own homes. That must be addressed.

That is but one issue. Rent certainty, rent tenure, the quality of tenure and the ridiculous circumstances of those who have mortgage-to-rent properties that are being taken from under their noses, thereby leaving them out on the road, must be addressed also. A holistic approach must result from the work of the committee, with a view to the making of recommendations to the Minister and his Department. The Minister has acknowledged that the conventional methods, processes and funding models can no longer sustain the extraordinary amount of investment that is required in order to address the extraordinary circumstances that prevail.

Like the Minister, I acknowledge the good intentions of the proposer of tonight’s Bill. Just as I was to the forefront, along with others, in putting a committee in place that sought to instruct and assist the Government in addressing this issue in the way in which an all-party committee believes it can and should, the Minister, along with his Department and the Government, must acknowledge the responsibility he has to take into consideration much of what is being presented by the committee, because it is representative of this Dáil and, by association, the people. The Government does not have the power to disregard any more. It does not have the power to analyse and scrutinise the proposals of this side of the House adequately, as it could have done in the past, most especially because of the magnitude of this issue.

In so far as I can, I am prepared to be responsible and pragmatic as a representative who has been given the privilege of addressing these issues, having taken on board the recommendations, good intentions, will and hard work of those involved with the committee, the parties and all others associated. Respect should be given to the process. It is not fair or appropriate to come forward with this Bill, despite the fact that, as I said, it is well-meaning. It is simplistic in nature and, in addition, addresses but one issue of the many that must be addressed holistically. That is why it undermines the work of the committee. That is why it is usurping and gazumping the committee. I, too, earnestly ask that this debate, on its conclusion, be adjourned until such time as the report is laid before the House, debated, analysed and scrutinised and, if and where necessary, improved by others in this House who have the opportunity to do so. At that stage, there will be a united approach on the part of us all to make a recommendation to the Minister to address this great crisis. If he or his Government fails to take on board those issues in a new way that involves an overhaul and a new consensus, the future of the Government will be at stake. As I said at the outset, we all agree this is the greatest crisis facing the economy and society at present. This has been the case for the past two years, unfortunately.

The Government that had the power in the last Dáil believed it could deal with this issue in the old, conventional style in which it had been addressed in years past, but this style cannot accommodate the sort of investment that is required nowadays. For example, the fiscal rules that govern the amount of spending by the Government in this area would not allow this issue to be addressed in the necessary manner. As I said, there has to be an extraordinary investment of many multiples of what was invested in the past. That can be done through special-purpose initiatives off the balance sheet. It could involve the State, housing agencies, the NTMA, the private sector and the credit unions that wish to participate. I hope all of these factors can combine to create an opportunity over a two-year period to address this matter such that we will be able to look back and say a commitment was made by the whole Dáil and all its parts to resolve an issue that needed to be resolved, a crisis. At that point, I could say to the person who asked me a couple of hours ago whether this Dáil can succeed that it could. However, if people will not play by the rules and acknowledge the changes that must be addressed, this Dáil will be dissolved sooner rather than later.

An election will then be called and we will waste another six months. In saying this, I am not casting aspersions on members of the public and the result they gave us to deal with. We dealt with the outcome of the election as pragmatists and responsible citizens, while respecting the decision of the electorate, as convoluted as we may have found the configuration of representation in the House. I earnestly ask the proposer of the motion not to force a vote on the issue because if a division is forced, I and my party will vote against the motion.

Deputy Pat Casey

It is with frustration and disappointment that I will oppose the motion. I am frustrated because I wanted this Dáil to be different from its previous incarnations when the Chamber was used for party political gamesmanship, rather than as a forum for exchanges on policy proposals that would resolve the challenges facing the nation. There is no doubt that housing is a national crisis that requires urgent action. It was for this very reason that, despite the uncertainty around Government formation, the House decided to establish an all-party committee on housing and homelessness. Calls for the committee's creation were led by Sinn Féin and the committee, with members from Sinn Féin, including Deputy Eoin Ó Broin, working very hard under the chairmanship of my colleague, Deputy John Curran, to produce a report that will contain targeted actions to be published within 72 hours. As I do not have access to the report, I can only assume that it addresses the issue of rent certainty effectively and with a significant input from Deputy Ó Broin.

The responsible, purposeful and correct course of action would be to wait for the report and implement the actions it recommends as quickly as possible. While there will be differences of opinion on some of these actions, as is to be expected, to pre-empt the report with a simplistic Bill designed to generate publicity is not new politics but old, cynical and frustrating politics which I will not support.

I will work positively and in good faith with every Deputy from every political perspective who wants to provide solutions for those trapped in a rental market in which rents are rocketing out of control. We must not be tempted to put in place quick-fix solutions which would have the counterproductive effect of causing rental houses and apartments to be sold, thus shrinking supply even further.

I am saddened because families and tenants who are experiencing increasing and unaffordable rents, with the financial pressure and anxiety that goes with these, deserve better than the political game being played tonight. They are looking to politicians to work together to tackle what is a complex social and economic issue. Housing is a social and economic right, not a speculative market to be exploited at will. This Dáil must work to re-establish a working housing sector in which the rental market fits into a wider housing framework designed for the demographic realities of 2016 and beyond.

As a Deputy from Wicklow-East Carlow, I am acutely aware of the various rental issues in my commuting constituency. In north County Wicklow rents have spiralled out of reach for prospective tenants and out of control for existing tenants. The Bill, if passed, would result in an increase in the number of property owners exiting the rental market, thus forcing more families out of their homes. This is an indisputable and sad fact. I have already observed this development in the rental accommodation scheme under which local authorities pay rent to private landlords on behalf of tenants for a set term. The gap between what can be paid by local authorities and what the private rental sector can demand has increased dramatically throughout Wicklow in recent years. As a result, landlords are exiting the rental accommodation scheme and selling their properties, leaving families homeless. This is just one area of the rental sector where we can clearly see that the Bill before us would make matters worse.

Rent certainty is needed and the Fianna Fáil Party proposed measures, published in our policy document, Generation Rent, to stabilise rent prices immediately by restricting rents to an area-based rental index both within and between tenancies. This is similar to the model in operation in many German cities. The system would be in place for a maximum three-year period, pending annual reviews of the effects of the regulations on market supply.

What is equally required in the Irish context is a wide-ranging package of housing actions where each sector - public and private, rental and ownership, building and regulatory - is clearly managed. This would ensure that actions in one area would not cause difficulties in another.

I ask that the Bill be withdrawn to allow the all-party report to be discussed by all Deputies and enable the Dáil to serve as an example of new politics working on behalf of all people, rather than as a smokescreen for the old and cynical political game which only erodes trust in the ability of politics to resolve the housing crisis.

Deputy Shane Cassells

I welcome the opportunity to speak on this topic because I have been listening with great interest to the debates of the Committee on Housing and Homelessness in recent weeks. The committee has had various groups before it as it tries to get a firm handle on the problem and produce an overall set of proposals for the Minister to consider and discuss with all sides of the House.

The committee, for which Sinn Féin called in the early days of this Thirty-second Dáil, will report this Friday. There is no doubt, given that all parties and many experts across the board fed into its recommendations, that the results of its work will form the basis for responding to the major national crisis facing us. This is a crisis about which there should not be any rancour or division among the political groupings in the Dáil. We should try to reach a consensus to ensure we tackle the crisis in a meaningful way.

I was particularly interested in listening to the contribution to the Committee on Housing and Homelessness of the chairman of the City and County Managers Association, Mr. Eugene Cummins. Mr. Cummins, who is also the chief executive of Roscommon County Council, previously held the position of director of services in Meath County Council and was the town manager in Navan. Deputy Peadar Tóibín and I know Mr. Cummins well. He thinks deeply about the issues and challenges facing local councils as the lead authorities for dealing with this issue. In his conclusions, Mr. Cummins noted the great importance of ensuring the private sector becomes a main player in the provision of housing because the problem of trying to find a home is common not only to the many thousands who find themselves on council housing waiting lists - on which people can wait up to eight years to be housed as is the case in County Meath - but also to those who earn a decent income. While they have the ability to purchase a home, they are as far away as ever from turning the dream of home ownership into a reality because of the lack of homes being built. No one seems to stand up for this whole new group of people in the squeezed middle. I will stand up for those who cannot get on the property ladder because there are no homes being built, especially in pressure areas such as County Meath, County Louth, which is represented by Deputy Gerry Adams, County Kildare and County Wicklow, which Deputy Pat Casey represents.

Among the issues the committee examined in connection with the lack of activity in housing construction is the cost of constructing a home and the taxes associated with doing so. Having listened to Deputy Mick Wallace speak very knowledgeably about this issue, I agree with much of what he said on the subject. There is no doubt that the lack of supply caused by the absence of construction has allowed unscrupulous landlords to exploit people in receipt of rent supplement as well as those who earn a good wage but find themselves paying exorbitant rents because the market has given those in command of property the upper hand. The figures clearly demonstrate the reason this has occurred. Last year, 9,000 homes were constructed when we need at least 25,000 housing units per annum. It is a case of simple mathematics.

The need to rebalance the market in favour of people seeking accommodation must be tackled in a manner that helps those affected, rather than makes matters worse or creates a short-term spike in rents in what is already a volatile marketplace or makes people homeless rather than keeping them in their homes. We cannot do this in isolation from all the other issues discussed in this debate.

As Deputy Pat Casey noted, the Fianna Fáil Party proposes an area-based rental index governed by the Private Residential Tenancies Board, PRTB, for a maximum of three years. There is no doubt that the key issue of supply must be addressed. For too long, the building industry and builders who provide homes have been considered dirty words.

When I hear the emotive and grandiose speeches in this House from people on the left, I often wonder who they think will build the homes that will sort out this problem. Do they think it will be magic fairies or little people with pixie dust? I hear all the problems, but the reality is that some people on the left must acknowledge that we need builders to help those people to get their first homes. This applies not only to those on the council housing waiting list, but those in the squeezed middle. They have the capacity to buy a home but are being squeezed out because of the conditions that exist at present. This is something those on the left cannot bring themselves to do.

There is a broken market and a broken housing sector. It is not only impacting on those who are struggling to get a home. It does not encourage people who could get a home either. Let us look closely at the detail and the findings of the committee report on Friday. Let us work collectively to try to find an agreed strategy such that landlords, those who are hoarding zoned land and the statutory agencies are all made aware that there is a serious plan on the table with teeth. In this way they will get the message that they need to respond to it or else they will get beaten into submission.

Deputy Jan O'Sullivan

There is absolutely no doubt but that the boom and bust cycle our economy went through in recent years has had a major and traumatic effect on the rights of people of varying households in Irish society to the most basic of needs, a secure home. The response to this difficult and challenging issue must be complex and multi-factoral. It requires us to counterbalance the private property rights in the Constitution with the principles of social justice and the common good. This means the State must intervene not only to fund, but to regulate the market and protect and provide for its citizens.

Tonight's Bill is limited in scope but it is an important element in tackling affordability in the private rental market. Previous speakers, including the Minister, have made valid points about the fact that the all-party committee will report on Friday. I hope Sinn Féin will respond to these calls but, in any event, if it is pushed to a vote the Labour Party will support the Sinn Féin Bill. It remains to be seen whether this will arise. We will support the Bill because linking rent to the consumer price index will ensure rent increases remain affordable and related directly to the general cost of living. It is a limited but important measure to bring that about. It continues the progress made last November, when the law was amended to give added protection to tenants and limit rent reviews to once every two years. I disagree with the remarks of Deputy Adams, who suggested those measures did not have an effect. I believe they have had a positive effect. I have dealt with many individuals who have been relieved to know that their rent cannot go up for two years.

This is a limited measure. The report of the all-party committee to be published later this week will no doubt contain a comprehensive series of recommendations. I agree with Deputy Cassells that everyone in the House needs to work together to provide solutions to this issue. Nevertheless, we support the measure being introduced by Sinn Féin tonight.

The Labour Party is working on drafting a wide-ranging housing Bill which we intend to publish as our contribution to the debate sometime within the next fortnight. It will include a measure relating to the consumer price index as well as a number of actions to improve affordability for tenants. It will also address the need for security for tenants and measures to significantly boost the supply of housing, which is probably more important. It is because of the shortage of supply that we have such serious problems of affordability. That is one of the main reasons the issue of affordability arises. Supply is an important factor. The Minister has promised to publish his action plan and we will be watching very closely in this regard.

I also wish to raise the issue of funding. Significant funding is available to build social and affordable housing. The €4 billion multi-annual capital fund announced by the last Government in conjunction with the social housing strategy is available to be spent. The real challenge is to have it spent. The evidence thus far is that local authorities have not been as quick as we would like them to be in spending the money available.

I welcome the additional €200 million announced today by the Minister, Deputy Coveney, and his colleague, the Minister for Public Expenditure and Reform, Deputy Donohue, to support local authorities in providing infrastructure to facilitate housing development. I understand it will become available next year. I hope the Minister will not take his eye off the more immediate need to get these same local authorities to spend the money they have been allocated for social housing. The list of approved construction, turnkey and large scale acquisition projects for which capital was allocated to local authorities in 2015 and 2016 amounts to over €600 million. It is imperative that these houses are delivered on time. A number of houses have been funded. I have before me a list from the appendix to the outcome published earlier this year. A total of 3,366 houses are listed in a variety of local authorities throughout the country. Having examined the list, it is clear some of these houses were approved in May 2015, others were approved in July 2015 and still more were approved in January 2016. Progress has been slow in delivering this social housing. Moreover, it is alarming that the specific measure introduced by the former Minister, Deputy Kelly, is not being used. Under that measure local authorities could make a single funding submission for social housing developments of 15 or fewer units up to a cost of €2 million. This measure simply does not appear to have been used at all on the basis of the evidence we have. That is not acceptable given the level of need. Councils are not using this option to construct small developments. There have been suggestions that councils are concerned about the risk of going over budget, but that cannot be used as an excuse. I urge the Minister to ensure that councils take up this practical proposal. They need only make one submission to the Department and they can then build up to 15 units. I have just left the Department of Education and Skills. School authorities throughout the country use a devolved grant to provide classrooms. They are willing to take it upon themselves to organise the construction of classrooms. I do not see why local authorities cannot do the same thing. I urge the Minister to ensure that they do so and spend the considerable funding that has been made available. It is up to local councillors to ensure that they push for the spending of this money and do not put obstacles in the way.

The voluntary housing sector is playing a crucial role and must be supported to grow its contribution in the delivery of new units and support for tenants. This morning, I had the opportunity to launch the Housing First programme in Limerick for the Novas Initiatives. That is only one example of the strong positive work of the voluntary housing sector in delivering units and supporting tenants, especially vulnerable tenants, to stay in their accommodation. Those involved also give 24-hour wrap-around support and service to tenants.

Deputy Cowen mentioned specific measures to deal with the needs of students. These should be introduced as well because the needs of students tend to be more short term and somewhat different from the needs of other private renters. This is another area that needs to be addressed.

There is no doubt that the private rented sector has evolved rapidly, especially in recent years. We have a great deal to learn from models in other countries. For many years other countries have had stable organised private rented sectors. We need to learn from those models to provide secure homes for people on a long-term basis. While this is a limited measure, it is one of several measures required to address the issue.

Acting Chairman (Deputy Bernard J. Durkan)

Deputy Ruth Coppinger is next. Are you sharing time?

Deputy Ruth Coppinger

I am sharing time with Deputy Boyd Barrett.

Acting Chairman (Deputy Bernard J. Durkan)

You have four minutes each.

Deputy Ruth Coppinger

The number of people who have been forced into the private rented sector has effectively doubled in Ireland. The private rented sector is the sector of insecurity, stress, poverty and homelessness. Some 40 years ago, local authorities provided one third of all housing in this State. Today, the corresponding provision is minuscule. Instead, low-income families are forced into the private rented sector, yet the State subsidises the rents of one third of all private landlords instead of actually building homes. It spends €5.5 billion in rent supplement.

It has been clear for a number of years - this is not new - that Government inaction on rocketing rents has led to homelessness. I support tonight's Bill. However, I believe it is the very minimum that is needed. On its own it would be inadequate because my reading of it is that it applies only to existing tenancies. However, I fully support the Bill.

We actually need rents to come down. Does the Minister think the current rent levels are acceptable? I know of low-paid workers with families who are paying €1,400 in rent for not very nice houses - very substandard accommodation. That is what people in Tyrrelstown threatened by vulture funds are paying. I hope the Minister does not think that is acceptable. If he does not think it is acceptable, I am mystified as to why he is telling us tonight that we need to slow down and not move too fast. Rents in my area have gone up by €341 in two years.

I heard the Minister say earlier that the measures the Government put in place last year were beginning to work. He obviously did not read the daft.ie rental report, which shows a 15th consecutive quarter of rent increases. Professor P. J. Drudy has testified that all that has happened is that rents have doubled to get around the very limited rent certainty measures introduced by the former Minister, Deputy Alan Kelly. It was not the Constitution that prevented the former Minister from introducing rent controls last year; it was a concerted campaign by what Professor P. J. Drudy called the Irish and international property investment groups - companies such as Kennedy Wilson that wrote to the Department of Finance suggesting that it not proceed. I hope that is not what the hesitation of the Minister tonight is about, because the dogs in the street know that this is the very minimum needed. It is a matter of urgency. Does the Minister have any sense of an emergency when he stands over there and suggests that we should not move too fast? We do not need a housing committee to tell us this is needed; it is obviously needed. It is the very minimum required, and the Minister should not shirk from bringing it in. We need to go further and introduce proper rent controls that stop new leases and new tenancies from being rack-rented and entire apartment blocks from being built out and rents of €2,000 or €2,500 being charged for them. The Minister needs to get with the programme. We need rent certainty. We need rent controls now.

Deputy Richard Boyd Barrett

I also support the Bill, although, as Deputy Coppinger said, we need to go a hell of a lot further and we need to do it very fast. I do not understand the reticence being expressed by the Government and Fianna Fáil about the committee and so on. If this can roll in to highlight the issue, further indicate the urgency of it and roll into any good that comes out - I certainly hope something good comes out on Thursday - that is all to the good. However, it seems this is a minimal measure against which it is impossible to argue. I do not see what the problem is. In any event, after Second Stage it will go to further Stages after Thursday and we can discuss it there.

I say now to our Sinn Féin comrades that we need to go a hell of a lot further on rent, because this will not deal with the fact that rents are already out of control and need to be scaled back. We need models such as the Scottish model whereby something like a beefed-up PRTB goes into a place and specifies that a landlord cannot charge more than €1,100 for a specific dwelling. The Minister and Fianna Fáil keep referring to the market. The market has failed. Markets cannot be allowed to set rents. This model has failed. It is not a theoretical discussion any more, one that we can debate in university debating chambers.

Deputy Simon Coveney

It was never a theoretical discussion.

Deputy Richard Boyd Barrett

I am just telling the Minister that he has to reach the point at which he acknowledges that the market cannot be allowed to set rents, because the market is setting rents that are absolutely unaffordable for the vast majority of people. If there is no recognition of that, we are going nowhere.

The situation is worse. The first time I brought homeless people to the Dáil was in 2012. I brought in about ten or 15 families. I warned then there was a crisis and the then Government laughed at me because, at that time, for a very brief period, rents were decreasing, as were property prices. I warned then - because in Dún Laoghaire they did not go down - that they were going back up everywhere and that there would be a crisis in a year or two. I was laughed at by the former Minister, Mr. Pat Rabbitte, and others.

In Dún Laoghaire now it is disastrous. Rents for a three-bedroom house are €2,200 on average. That has nearly doubled in the past two years. The HAP scheme is a write-off - it will not happen in Dún Laoghaire. Unless we ratchet up the provision of social housing and scale back rents to affordable levels that are related to people's income, we are going nowhere. Even the most cursory examination of the situation in parts of this city would tell the Minister that. He needs to get with reality.

The Minister needs to stop with the mantra of the market. I do not know what this obsession is. The Minister is still referring to the 75,000 units he will deliver through the HAP scheme. It will not happen. I also hear ideological claptrap that supply will solve the problem. Does anybody's memory stretch back even to 2006 and 2007? We had supply to beat the band. Did it make rents affordable or property prices affordable? No. Supply does not bring rent down and it does not bring property prices down. We know that from 2006, 2007 and 2008. It did not do it. We had the biggest level of supply in the history of the State, and rent and property prices went up because the people who were building them were interested in profit and the market was setting the rate. So even if the supply is increased via the private for-profit sector, I guarantee it will not solve the problem. Without controlled and subsidised low rents and housing, including affordable housing - I heard mention of the squeezed middle - we will not solve the problem. We should support any measure that moves us in that direction, but we need to go a lot further.

Acting Chairman (Deputy Bernard J. Durkan)

I call Deputy Broughan, who is sharing time with Deputies Maureen O'Sullivan and Connolly.

Deputy Thomas P. Broughan

I am delighted to have a brief opportunity to speak on this important Bill. I thank the Sinn Féin Party for bringing it to the House for debate. The Rent Certainty Bill will amend section 19 of the Residential Tenancies Act 2004 by repealing section 19(2)(b) of the Act and introducing section 19A to provide for the linking of rent reviews to the level of inflation as indicated in the consumer price index.

Throughout the last Dáil and the previous one, I advocated some kind of rent control as a public policy. I remember raising the issue one morning on the Order of Business and there were howls of anguish from Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael at the mere mention of some kind of rent control. While people will argue that the Sinn Féin Bill will cause constitutional difficulties or that to advance to more stringent rent control as advocated by the previous two speakers would not be possible, it is possible. We know that rent regulation could have been introduced. In the House tonight is a former Minister from the previous Government who could have done that, as could her successor.

I am concerned about the spiralling cost of rent, particularly in Dublin and the regions around Dublin. As the Irish Independent journalists Dearbhail McDonald and Paul Melia showed yesterday morning, in Dublin and in all the commuter regions around our great cities, rents are spiralling completely out of control. It is very striking that rents in Dublin are now higher than they were in 2007 and that nationally rents are 8.6% higher compared with the same time last year. Yet people's income has remained pretty static.

The recent NEC report to the Committee on Housing and Homelessness recommended rent regulation "through a mechanism for disciplined market-sensitive rent adjustment". That clearly can happen. The previous Minister seemed to feel he had gone towards rent certainty, but he had not; he just introduced a mechanism which, along with rent uplifts, gave some little assistance to existing tenants.

He did not address rent certainty at all. This Bill would do that at least. The former Minister, Deputy Kelly, buckled when the pressure came on from Fine Gael colleagues such as the Minister, Deputy Coveney. He buckled completely in the face of an onslaught from Fine Gael and the property interests that back up the two bigger parties in this House. We ended up without any kind of rent regulation. As a result, some 2,000 children are homeless tonight.

Deputy Maureen O'Sullivan

Such is the extent of the housing crisis, it is almost as if we are back in the days when the Land League was campaigning for the three Fs. I think a similar campaign is needed today. We have done a great deal of talking in the previous Dáil and in this one. I am a member of the Committee on Housing and Homelessness, which has heard a wide variety of presentations on many aspects of the housing crisis. While it is obvious that there is no quick-fix solution, action will have to be taken. I suggest that a series of actions, backed by the resources needed to make a difference, implementation plans and timeframes, will be required.

Rent is obviously central to the crisis. It is appalling that rents are increasing for no apparent reason other than the ability of landlords to provide for increases. I know of monthly rent increases of €100, €200, €300 or more that have been applied to accommodation that has not been improved or amended. I do not suggest that landlords should be deprived of the ability to make a profit, but we cannot have a system in which rents may be increased at will at any time. I know efforts were made in the previous Dáil to provide for rent certainty. A measure was introduced in November 2015 to guarantee rents for two years, but the period leading into its introduction was too long. Rents continued to increase during that lead-in period because landlords were able to do what they wanted while the proposal was being debated.

We know that housing policy has to be about affordability, equality and ease of access. The 2020 social housing strategy contains a commitment to a pilot cost-rental model, as recommended by various groups. Large-scale intervention is needed, particularly in Dublin and the major cities. We need rent certainty. It is essential for the housing market. It would be of benefit to landlords and tenants. It would mean that rent increases and decreases could be foreseen and could help to ensure they are reasonable. I think the Bill before the House, which proposes to link rents to the consumer price index, sounds reasonable and is welcome. It would mean the results of rent reviews would be in line with the calculations of the Central Statistics Office. I accept the point that the natural progression would have involved the presentation of the report of the Committee on Housing and Homelessness, followed by the introduction of the various Bills that are required.

Deputy Catherine Connolly

I have absolutely no hesitation in supporting this minimal measure, which seeks to control increasing rents. I always try to introduce a balance to these debates. There is a major housing crisis in Galway city and county. As I have said every time I have had an opportunity to participate in a debate on housing, there are 15,000 people on the waiting list in Galway. That is a conservative estimate. When I made a phone call today regarding the number one family on the three-bedroom list, which has been on the list since 2002, the official answer from the city council was that it has no idea when it will be in a position to provide a home for the family in question.

It is disconcerting, at the very least, to hear Fianna Fáil talking about the new politics while playing the old politics. There would be nothing wrong with passing this legislation tonight, regardless of Sinn Féin's motivation in introducing it. At best, the introduction of this legislation is an indication of the urgency that must be attached to the problems caused by rents increasing to the levels that have been quoted tonight by all Deputies on the left. I am still seeing a mixed response from the Government and from Fianna Fáil when solutions are proposed.

While I look forward to the publication of the report of the Committee on Housing and Homelessness on Friday, I am not heartened by what I have heard from the Minister this evening. I think his mind is still in the market, as a previous speaker said. He thinks the market will provide the supply. The market created this problem and has failed to provide the supply. The Government has created the problem in the market. The fanfare with which the social housing programme was announced last year or the year before by the former Minister, Deputy Kelly, simply added to the market problem. I refer to his suggestion that the market would provide 75,000 homes under the wrong name of "social housing".

In the past two years, we have repeatedly been told in Galway city that the housing assistance payment, which puts guaranteed money into the pockets of landlords, is the only game in town. The former Minister, Deputy Jan O'Sullivan, told us tonight that councils are to blame. It is very upsetting to hear that local authorities are to blame. I would like this to be put to bed once and for all. If city and county managers have failed to use the money allocated to them at a time of housing crisis, it is nothing short of scandalous and they should be held responsible. If that is not the position, the Deputy should apologise for casting aspersions on city managers.

Deputy Jan O'Sullivan

I have it here in front of me.

Deputy Catherine Connolly

Not a single local authority house has been built in Galway since 2009. I appreciate that some houses have been purchased or made available under the voluntary housing scheme, but not one local authority house has been built in Galway in recent years. I ask those who are wondering why there is a housing crisis to bear that in mind. I accept that there is a role for the market, but I suggest that the local authorities and the Government have an even bigger role in providing homes for our citizens. We cannot have healthy people without homes and without security of tenure. If we continue to ask families to move from one form of accommodation to another on a yearly or two-yearly basis, and therefore require children to move from one school to another at the same time, it is absolute nonsense to talk about having a healthy society.

Deputy Mattie McGrath

I am delighted to speak on this Bill, which proposes to link rent increases to the consumer price index. It is important to analyse and assess the dire housing crisis in this country. It should not give us any solace to be here this evening at the onset of darkness in the knowledge that over 2,000 children will sleep in hotel beds tonight and that many people are homeless. Successive Governments have failed to deal with this problem. It is necessary that we try to do so. I salute the interim housing committee that was established under the chairmanship of Deputy Curran. I know those who have made an input into the committee have worked hard. People from outside agencies and bodies have given their advice and input. I look forward with bated breath to reading the committee's report. I hope to do so by the end of the week. Many people have been writing about this issue from far and near. Many people have suggested ways of solving this crisis. We can have all the reports in the world, but none of them will bring any solace to those who are homeless, including many children and those who are sleeping rough tonight, or to the thousands of people who are living in dread of being made homeless.

This is a multifaceted problem. While I do not doubt Deputy Connolly, I was quite shocked to hear her say that no local authority houses have been built in Galway in the past year. Very few houses have been built in Tipperary. Something has gone fundamentally wrong. I know we had a deep and dark recession in recent years, but I remind the House that local authorities were able to build thousands of houses in the 1950s, 1960s and 1970s, and even into the 1980s and 1990s. There was very little construction equipment in the 1950s and 1960s. There was a reliance on manual labour because cranes and modern forms of technology, such as the modern means of excavation and construction, were not available. We seem to have some kind of inertia now. We do not seem able to respond to the need that exists. These issues are passed between the county managers and the directors of services and housing. They are passed up to the Department and back down again.

Funding has been announced by successive Ministers. The previous Minister, Deputy Kelly, announced that a multi-annual fund of €4 billion would be provided, but nothing is happening. This is highly frustrating for people who have been waiting for four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, ten, 11 or 12 years to be put on the housing list. It is fundamentally soul-destroying. This is happening in Wicklow, Tipperary and everywhere else. The number of approved applicants on the housing list in Tipperary is 30 or 40 short of 3,000. That is a massive figure. There are many unfinished estates in the county. When companies came to me in the last year or so because they wanted to buy those estates and offer them to local authorities with a quick turnaround, they were met with total disbelief.

Unfortunately, there is now a kind of taboo with regard to builders. Small builders, in particular, seem to be an endangered species. It is as if there is a bounty on their heads. If we do not enable small builders to provide housing, we will never restart the construction industry. I accept that many rogues and cowboys got into the building industry during the boom.

There are many good and decent builders who started off as tradesmen, becoming self-employed and employing people, building fine well-finished and good houses at reasonable prices. They are still out there willing to take up the cudgels but they cannot get a bob from the banks or credit from elsewhere.

There are also issues of blockages in terms of development lands. I welcome this week's announcement of €200 million by the Minister for Public Expenditure and Reform, Deputy Paschal Donohoe, and the Minister for the Environment, Community and Local Government, Deputy Simon Coveney, to deal with blockages, such as access to development land. This is not only needed in the major areas where there are significant crises but in small towns and villages.

I also welcome the penalties to be introduced in respect of those hoarding zoned lands. There are a lot of zoned lands, some of them are in NAMA while others are in no man's land. We need to deal with this situation.

Planning permission needs to be dealt with too. I have met several young couples who have acquired sites, hired architects, put money and deposits together for loans and have gone to much expense to build their own homes. However, they cannot get planning permission. The county councils are like the dog in the manger. They will not build houses for anybody nor will they allow people to build for themselves. I accept there must be planning guidelines and rules with good proper planning. However, the rules are over strenuous. The granting of planning permission is onerous and can cost a fortune. It is putting off those people who want to build their own houses, who do not want to add to the housing crisis and who have the vision, the wherewithal and the courage to borrow and to build. The former Minister, Deputy Alan Kelly, brought in a regulation to stop all that. The building of individual private houses was stopped in its tracks. This needs to be examined as well, as it is a multifaceted problem.

Last night, I chaired a meeting of the Carrick-On-Suir Voluntary Housing Association. The association has 17 two-bed units, built in 2000 and rented to tenants since 2001 at €55 a week. The rent has never been increased. We discussed it again last night but did not increase it. I salute voluntary bodies up and down the country, as well as the board of the Irish Council for Social Housing, which are making a significant contribution to housing. There used to be a one-stop shop for these voluntary housing boards to cut out the red tape. It must be remembered these voluntary groups are ordinary individuals giving their time voluntarily to supply houses. In 2009, someone decided - an bord snip was blamed for it but it was probably on the instruction of the departmental officials - to do away with this one-stop shop. Now the housing associations have to go to seven different parts of the country to deal with the Department. It is just frustratingly mind-boggling.

The same is happening with the county councils. They are passing paper back and forward with e-mails about talks about talks and meetings about meetings and sweet - I will not say it - is happening, or not much is happening, with house commencements or completions. When I was a councillor back in 2000, it was lovely to see the handover of the keys for council houses and to go to the official openings of local authority housing estates. However, it has all stopped. We need to examine why that is the case. The councils and the Department have to take up the cudgels, stand up and be held accountable as to why it is not happening at any level. We have voids lying idle for one to four years. The councils will claim they cannot get approval from the Department for the costs to repair the voids. We found out recently that if the repairs cost more than €12,000, it will have to go to the Department but the Department cannot get the money to the local authorities.

I compliment Sinn Féin for introducing this Bill tonight. We need a far more detailed response to housing. I had hoped we would wait a little longer, but not too much longer, to get the full package promised from the housing committee. However, we cannot wait forever, just rubbing our hands. That is no good to the homeless people. We are shirking our responsibilities if we do not act. I wish the Minister, Deputy Simon Coveney, well in his new role and hope he will be successful. This is a matter that needs to be dealt with urgently.

Deputy Catherine Murphy

In principle, the Social Democrats support the linking of rents to the consumer price index. Unfortunately, we are all too well aware of the significant escalation in rents. It is a point I raised right through the lifetime of the previous Dáil. It is particularly evident in large urban centres. Linking rents to the consumer price index is a good idea in theory. However, we cannot presuppose that the current levels of rents are affordable to begin with.

Renting is now the most expensive but the least secure of tenure types. The number of people renting has doubled over the past ten years. It is a whole area which requires a policy in its own right. Too often we have seen policy responses being just legislation when, in fact, it needs to be multifaceted. The Private Residential Tenancies Board requires to be significantly beefed up.

The crisis was evident several years ago and I was certainly raising it in 2012 at the environment committee. We were continually told that if there was a reduction in rent assistance, it would drive rents down, despite what we were seeing in our own areas. This crisis has been growing over the past several years. Last year in my area, rent for a three-bedroom house was €900. This year, it is €1,300. This is for no good reason other than the market is dictating the price. There has to be some mechanism of containing that.

Creating a viable rental sector is about far more than affordability, although it is of critical importance. It also requires consideration of issues such as security of tenure and rights for both landlords and tenants. There is more to be done about these. It is certainly the number one issue in my constituency office, and was the case over the lifetime of the past Dáil. I suspect this was also the case for most Deputies, particularly in urban and suburban areas.

When people ask me for advice about a tenancy dispute, I tell them to go to the Private Residential Tenancies Board. However, it will take about a year to have a dispute dealt with, meaning I have to give them that advice with a health warning. We need to have a sector which can be regulated and that has to be part of the solution.

At various stages, people will want to choose renting as an option. For some people, it is the only option but for others, it is a desired option. That is how it is in other European countries and in American cities. How do we get to a point where we have renting as an option? One cannot do so without security of tenure or affordability.

I support the idea of having large socially mixed estates where one is essentially building communities with mixed tenure types and different sizes of accommodation which will allow people to move up and down over their lifetime. That is the way to go. We have to deal with the crisis at this stage. One element of the crisis that is hard to understand is that there are 200,000 vacant houses around the country. The housing associations have been saying for the past several years that we have to find ways of reducing the level of vacancy.

For example, the level of vacancy in this city is about 8%. To reduce that to 4% would provide in the region of 20,000 houses, which would have an immediate impact on rents because the supply-side issue would be dealt with. There are reasons that people are not offering their houses for rent, some being simple things like the impediment created by the fair deal scheme. These are the kinds of things that need to be looked at in the immediate term.

We need a major scaling up of local authority building. When we met the Minister recently, we pointed out there is a reason that the local authorities are slow. We made the point that there needs to be a delivery aspect to the Housing Finance Agency, which would go in and project-manage the large new developments which might involve housing from the tier 3 housing associations, local authority houses or private houses. It requires to be managed so there needs to be that kind of intervention in the market. Even though this would scale up the local authority build, I do not think we should go back to the point where there is just one house type or tenure type in an area. This did not work in the past in some areas where very large housing estates were built and the only thing they had in common was that they were economically less well-off than other areas. A different response is needed if we are not to create problems later on.

We support the Bill in principle, although we do not see it as a silver bullet. It is one of a very large number of things that need to be done. It will be important that we not just have a report at the end of this week from the Minister because we need that report turned into action across a range of different responses. Obviously, limiting rent increases and linking them to the consumer price index is a realistic part of a bigger package.

Acting Chairman (Deputy Bernard J. Durkan)

Deputies Dessie Ellis and David Cullinane are sharing time. I call Deputy Ellis.

Deputy Dessie Ellis

For many years we have had a haemorrhage of people and families from rent supplement, RAS and the private rental market to homelessness. Recent legislation by the last Government has not stemmed this flow. The introduction of rules preventing landlords raising rents for two years and putting a moratorium of two years before another rise would be considered did not go anywhere near what was required. The ideological battle between Fine Gael and the ex-Minister with responsibility for housing, Deputy Alan Kelly, was very noticeable, with Fine Gael winning out. It was and still is clear that rent certainty was required, as well as an increase in rent supplement. The private rented sector is not fit for purpose in its current format and is actually contributing negatively to the housing and homelessness crisis.

At present there are approximately 6,000 homeless people in the country, 2,000 of whom are children. Most of them were previously living in the private rented sector and are now in hotels and bed and breakfast accommodation. According to a study commissioned by the Housing Agency in 2015, one of the most commonly cited reasons for family homelessness was lack of affordability in the private rented sector. Other common reasons were poor quality of accommodation in the private rented sector, that private rented property was to be sold or that the landlord wanted to move in.

This outlines a narrative of finance-related issues which, in part, are contributing to homelessness. If rent certainty is introduced, it will contribute in some part to an easing of the crisis. However, it is only one part of the solution. Rent supplement, which was meant originally to be a temporary measure, has been subsumed in HAP. Neither is adequate, and the supplement needs to be increased with a view to a long-term solution, leading to an introduction of rent regulations and the capping of rent subsidies to ensure rents demanded by landlords do not rise in tandem with an increase in the rent cap. Fine Gael's partners in the last Government also held this view but Fine Gael was ideologically opposed to it and stopped it last year. We are now a year on and rent prices have increased further. We cannot wait another month because the families who are looking to rent cannot wait.

As we all know, the price of renting has increased so much that it is now cheaper to have a mortgage than to rent. In my own consistency of Dublin North-West, the average rent for a three-bedroom house is €1,407 a month, whereas, for a 30-year mortgage at 4.3%, it is €1,029 a month, and even for a mortgage at 6.3%, it is €1,287. That is €1,400 a month before people pay for life's other necessities. It is scandalous and does not take into account that the ability to get a mortgage is beyond the capacity of the majority of families on the average industrial wage and is completely unachievable for any family on the minimum wage. To give these families a chance, a change in rent supplement needs to be made. That is why we must look beyond the private sector and towards Government and the councils to provide the long-term solution to this crisis.

We need to build more social housing which, in itself, will bring down rental prices. The introduction of rent certainty would allow for rent increases or decreases in line with inflation and tied to the consumer price index. We need to build and acquire more social housing to increase the stock, and the Bill before us will help that. Given our reliance on the private market for rental as well as to build social and affordable housing, the Government's last Bill means this will only apply to 10% of each scheme, which is scandalous. We should turn back the clock and look for 20% or 30%. The Minister must take this on board or we will be here in another year, arguing the same case because we will not be able to deliver enough social and affordable housing. The Government needs to be more imaginative.

Deputy David Cullinane

I have heard an awful lot in the last number of months about new politics and, already, it is becoming a bit of a tired cliché. I have not seen much evidence of it when it comes to my party and how Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael have treated our approach to the Thirty-second Dáil since I have become a Member.

The Government could have taken a constructive approach to our Bill today. It could have taken a positive approach to our genuine, earnest attempt to deal with a very important issue but it chose instead to take the most negative, the most sinister interpretation it could possibly find to cast aspersions on my party in regard to our intention in bringing this Bill forward. The Taoiseach today-----

Deputy Simon Coveney

I did not do that. Did the Deputy listen to what I was saying?

Deputy David Cullinane

I am talking about the Government. The Taoiseach, in this Chamber today, as I sat here on the Order of Business-----

Deputy Simon Coveney

The Deputy looks as if he wants to pick a fight.

Deputy David Cullinane

I am not interested in picking any fight. I am pointing out the reality of what the Taoiseach said and of what Fianna Fáil said about our Bill, namely, that we were playing political games. If the Minister does not believe that, and if he believes, like me, that is disingenuous, he should say that and say that what we are doing here tonight is in the best interests of citizens. It is Sinn Féin using our Private Members' time to do what is our job, which is to hold the Government to account and, more than that, to come forward with solutions. We did not bring forward a motion; we brought forward a practical Bill that can help people. However, the Government, whatever about the Minister personally, chose to look at the negative rather than the positive. When it comes to my party, what Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael want to do is to continuously create this narrative that we are not serious, that we are negative and that we are opposing for opposition's sake when, in fact, what is happening is that the Government is opposing what we are bringing forward simply for opposition's sake.

That is what is happening. I hope it will not be the pattern of this new politics. I say sincerely to the Minister that I want to work constructively with the Government. However, when we bring forward proposals, the Government has to give them the same merit it is asking us to give its proposals when it brings them forward.

Deputy Simon Coveney

Why do we not adjourn the debate and we will do that?

Deputy David Cullinane

I hope that is genuinely the position of the Government and not just the Minister's position, because he is seen by many people outside the Chamber as the friendly face of the Fine Gael Party. Unfortunately, the Fine Gael Party does not always sing from the same hymn sheet as the Minister did this evening.

To get to the heart of this issue, we are dealing with people who are in dire straits. One would think listening to some of the speeches that none of what happened is the fault of policy-makers and that rising rents are somehow an accident of the market. The reality is the State chose to stop building social housing and not to build local authority housing. This did not just happen in the course of the recession. The State stopped building local authority housing even during the boom. Even at the height of the Celtic tiger we started to slow down and we did not build social housing because we were far too reliant on the private sector. If I can have the Minister's attention, we were far too reliant on the private sector and it was all Part V social and affordable housing. What happened, of course, when the crash came was that we stopped building social housing and no local authority housing units were built. The private sector also stopped building, so Part V social and affordable houses dried up and we had no new builds. Everybody in the private rental sector was competing with social housing applicants, and now 95% of social housing applicants are being told by the State the only way it will meet their needs is through the private rental sector. This did not happen because it was inconsistent or incidental to Government policy. All this happened because of policy. The reason rents have increased is social housing tenants and those in need of social housing are competing with those who want private rental accommodation. This is what happened.

We want sustainable and fair rents. Nobody is saying this, in and of itself, is a panacea or the only solution, but it is one way in which we can bring about greater certainty for those families who need it and for those families in need of support. The rising rents we have at present are not sustainable.

Moving away from rent prices being set by the market would also be good for landlords, because it does not suit them to see a spike or rise in rents or, as they have seen in the past, rents drop to unsustainable levels. It suits everybody to have much fairer and sustainable rent prices in the State. Our Bill is an honest attempt to do this. Whatever the committee we proposed will recommend over the coming weeks, it will not prevent the Minister from accepting the Bill. If he really believes this is the right thing to do and it is not just about opposing it for ideological reasons, he should let it go through. I appeal to the Minister to do this, to be constructive and positive and to practise what he preaches. He should let the Bill go through, and whatever differences we have let us work them out in a constructive way on Committee Stage.

Deputy John Paul Phelan

I welcome the chance to say a few words on the Bill. I find myself agreeing with much of what Opposition speakers, including members of Sinn Féin, have said, but I fundamentally disagree with them on the matter of rent controls by another name, which is contained in the Bill. I will refer to this later.

I should declare my interests. I am a landlord, completely by accident. I am not sure if I am one of those who should be locked up according to some members of the Government. Like thousands of people, because of the economic situation in which the country found itself, I became a landlord completely by accident and unintentionally. I feel I should declare this at the start.

It does not matter whether one is from Sinn Féin, Fine Gael or any other political party, we all deal with people. Anyone who has been a member of a local authority, as I was until 14 years ago, has dealt with people trying to get and keep housing. The fundamental issue is one of supply. The Sinn Féin speakers are right. At the height of the boom, the State through its agencies got out of the provision of public housing, which was a disastrous mistake. It was a calamitous error at a time when the economy was overheating because of a bubble in construction when we thought we would have enough houses forever and a day. This meant not only did the private housing supply collapse once the economy collapsed, but increases in public housing supply were non-existent at that stage. The figure of 25,000 units is reckoned to be the number we need to produce per annum, and I welcome the fact the Government has set this as its target. I genuinely welcome what was announced today by the Ministers, Deputies Coveney and Donohoe, regarding proposals to fund necessary infrastructural improvements to ensure lands suitable for housing are able to be developed.

During the period of the Celtic tiger, most local authorities significantly reduced their landbanks. Where they have land, most of it is not in the areas with major demand for housing. This is a disastrous legacy of the politics of the former Minister, Mr. Noel Dempsey, who was the man who kicked me off the local authority 14 years ago when he got rid of the dual mandate. He was also the man who introduced Part V of the Planning and Development Act. He did many very damaging things to the country, as it turned out.

I wish to express my opposition, which I suppose is ideological, to rent controls. I do not see it as an ideological question. I studied rent controls when I was in college. There is no example of any city in the world where rent controls have had a positive effect in the medium or long term on the provision of housing, so a serious political party should not propose it as part of a measure. Of course it should be discussed, but it has not worked anywhere, so why would we look to introduce it here? The reason it has not worked is because it decreases the supply of available accommodation. This happened in every city, most famously in New York where, over the first ten years of rent controls, 300,000 fewer housing units became available because those who had a lot of money, wealth and property were not making enough of a return from renting and it was not economic for others to maintain accommodation at the necessary standards. It would be like a doctor writing a prescription for a patient and recommending medication which made the patient worse. This is why rent controls should not happen.

There is much in the Bill and in what has been discussed with which I agree. While we never know how long a Dáil will last or how long anybody will be in any position, there is an opportunity. So far, the Minister has proved himself eager to address this problem. We have all sat at desks with people with tears in their eyes who do not know where they will spend that night or where they will be the following week. There is nothing more dear to Irish people than the sense of home. The biggest calamity that has befallen us following the collapse of the Celtic tiger economy is that so many people now find themselves homeless, most of them through no fault of their own. There have always been homeless people who suffer from contributory problems, such as addiction or mental health issues. I urge the Minister in whatever time he has to ensure he addresses homelessness and housing provision, but not to go down the route of rent controls.

Minister of State at the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade (Deputy Joe McHugh)

Rinne an tAire, an Teachta Coveney, cur síos níos luaithe ar cé chomh tiomanta is atá an Rialtas chun ár ngéarchéim tithíochta a shárú. Téann an ghéarchéim sin i bhfeidhm ar gach cuid den earnáil tithíochta, an earnáil chíosa ina measc. Ní foláir mar sin de go mbeadh ár gcur chuige iomlánaíoch agus bunaithe ar an tuiscint go bhfuil gach cuid den earnáil tithíochta idirspleách agus fite fuaite ina chéile.

Tá costas teach a thógáil ar chíos in Éirinn méadaithe go suntasach ó thosú na hathbheochana thart ar ceithre bhliain ó shin. Níl na leibhéil cíosa fós tagtha ar ais go dtí na leibhéil a bhí ann roimh thobchliseadh an gheilleagair, ach i mBaile Atha Cliath tá na leibhéil anois blúire níos airde ná an buaicphointe a bhí ann ag deireadh 2007.

It was precisely because of continuing rent increases that the Government introduced a package of rent stability and additional housing supply measures in November. The Residential Tenancies (Amendment) Act 2015, enacted on 4 December 2015, introduced a number of measures to address rent stability and housing supply.

Regarding rent stability, the Act provides, inter alia, that the minimum period between rent reviews for tenancies will be increased from 12 to 24 months and this new provision will apply for a four-year period. In addition, the minimum period of notice of new rent is increased from 28 days to 90 days and longer notice periods for the termination of long-term tenancies have been introduced. Each of these new provisions commenced on enactment.

Further provisions to support rent stability in the 2015 Act include that notice of new rent sent must be in a prescribed form, include details of dispute resolution procedures available through the Residential Tenancies Board and be accompanied by details of rent in respect of three comparable dwellings in the area, and that notification of a rent increase to the RTB will include, among other things, a signed statement by tenants that they are aware of their rights in relation to rent and rent reviews. The extension of the period between rent reviews from 12 to 24 months takes effect from the date of the last review, so if a tenant had a rent review in July 2015, the next rent review will not be until July 2017.

The RTB quarterly rent index, which is compiled by the Economic and Social Research Institute for the Residential Tenancies Board, is the most accurate and authoritative rent report of its kind on the private accommodation sector in Ireland. It is based on new tenancies commenced each quarter and on the actual rents being paid, as distinct from the asking or advertised rent. The most recent RTB rent index for the first quarter of 2016 shows that the rate of rent inflation is cooling, with rents up nationally by 0.5% over the fourth quarter of 2015 and by 0.2% in Dublin. This compares to a national growth rate of 1.6% in the first quarter of 2015, almost 4% in the third quarter and over 2.5% in the second quarter. The data also show that the supply challenge remains acute. The trend in new tenancy registrations is downward, with annual tenancy registrations peaking in 2013 - with nearly 112,000 tenancies registered in that year - but dipping consecutively in 2014 and 2015. Overall numbers of registered tenancies have increased though suggesting that tenants are staying longer in their properties, thereby reducing the normal supply churn.

It is still early days, of course, but there is reasonable cause to believe that these rent data represent the first stage in a welcome stabilisation of the rental market as the new provisions begin to take proper effect. Fundamentally, the increases in rent have been driven by a combination of economic recovery and a lack of supply. The rent stability measures are one side of the equation. Measures to support accelerated supply across all tenures are also critical. In addition to measures already under way under Construction 2020 and the social housing strategy to tackle this issue, the November package included the following measures to further address supply: a targeted development contribution rebate initiative in Dublin and Cork and changes to planning guidelines on apartment standards.

There is no on-off button for the delivery of additional rental accommodation. It will take time for the supply measures in particular to take effect and alleviate some of the pressures.

I welcome the motion and the opportunity for debate. The Minister's bona fides in seeking an adjournment should still stand, and I ask Sinn Féin to consider this and a longer period of time to consider this issue after the recess. I would also like to point out that we have a serious supply problem. We all know this and we all know where the population is going globally - 9 billion by 2030, 65% of whom will be living in urban centres. We will be part of that challenge, and this is the House to debate it. I welcome the announcement of the Minister for Public Expenditure and Reform, Deputy Donohoe, today. Every little bit helps. His was a big intervention today. I also acknowledge the passion, commitment and drive of the Minister for Housing, Planning and Local Government, Deputy Coveney, to try to find a solution, but he will not be doing it on his own. It will be done together with all the stakeholders, and that is not just the people in this House.

Deputy Donnchadh Ó Laoghaire

The knowledge that we will have a place to stay tonight, a warm home to go back to, is one of the greatest forms of security and peace of mind that anyone could have. The lack of that security, the lack of that knowledge, is something that most of us will never understand and hope never to have to understand. The fact of 2,000 children being homeless in Ireland in April 2016 is a scandal which shames us all. It is the most appalling and urgent face of the housing crisis and should motivate us all here to ensure that it is resolved and never allowed to repeat itself. Tá sé scannalach go bhfuil sé sin ag tarlú sa lá atá inniu ann agus tá dualgas orainn go léir, ar an Rialtas ach go háirithe, an cheist sin a réiteach.

The lack of affordable or even close to affordable accommodation directly impacts upon homelessness - for example, people who just cannot find anywhere else to go after they get their notice. Our office deals with such people day in, day out, as I am sure do many other offices. Some end up in hotels and emergency accommodation, some end up in their cars and some even end up on the streets. What we sometimes do not discuss, however, is the massive sacrifices that people are making in this country so that they can stay in their homes and have that security, even if it means discomfort and misery. I do not believe any Deputy would contradict me when I say there are people in this city, in my own city and right across Ireland who are going hungry to make rent, who in winter scrimp on heating simply to make rent and to stay where they are, even if that means staying in a tiny old bungalow, perhaps 100 years old, damp, cold and in terrible condition. At least for them it is better than having nowhere. Ar uaireamh is daoine aosta atá i gceist ansin. Tá sé go dona dá sláinte agus is cruatan fíochmhar atá ann dóibh.

Inability to find a place to rent that is affordable also means that people, many of whom have spent years on local authority waiting lists, move back in with parents, causing unbearable overcrowding, perhaps to the point of squalor. I am aware of a case of three adults, three teenagers and a nine-year-old, a mixture of boys and girls, all squeezed into a two-bedroom Cork City Council flat. If they could find anywhere else to rent that they could afford, you can be sure they would.

High rents are also forcing people to move huge distances to find any place. I have dealt with families who have had to move a considerable distance from the city to get anywhere at all. I have dealt with families who have moved from Ballincollig to Baile Bhúirne, from Ballyphehane to Youghal and from Carrigaline to Kealkill. The Minister will be familiar with those distances. They are distances of 28, 32 and 50 miles, respectively. People have to move their entire lives and perhaps leave the communities in which they grew up and the schools their children attended. The housing crisis in Cork is getting more severe by the day. This is illustrated by the fact that Cork city saw an increase of an enormous 16% in rents in a year. That is a much greater increase year-on-year than in Dublin or any other urban centre. The average cost of renting a home is now €1,003 but it is much higher than that in some areas. The dynamic in the city is replicated and echoed just outside it, in places such as Carrigaline, Ballincollig and Glanmire. Tá tionchar millteanach aige seo ar theaghlaigh ar fud na cathrach agus an chontae.

The housing crisis is first and foremost a social crisis and is causing huge hardship for many families across the city and county, with the number of homeless on the streets increasing substantially. This alone should prompt us to deal with it firmly and conclusively. However, there is increasingly evidence that this crisis could hamper growth in our city as well and may have implications for employment prospects. The Minister will be aware that we have heard the CEO of Voxpro previously express his concern that its ability to expand was being held back by the rental crisis as so many of its employees were struggling to find affordable accommodation in Mahon, Blackrock, Douglas or anywhere across the southside, and doubtless this is true for many other businesses as well. We are also seeing tenants facing eviction because of vulture capitalists buying portfolios of housing and seeking to remove tenants before selling on, as we saw with Eden in Blackrock and Tyrrelstown here in Dublin.

Tackling the housing crisis will obviously involve substantial social housing building. However, it also requires providing greater security for tenants and ensuring that rents stay at an affordable level. The regulations of the previous Minister, Deputy Kelly, have proven to be inadequate, and there is an obvious - very obvious to renters in any event - need for this legislation, which fixes rent increases to the consumer price index. People deserve to know that they will be able to stay in their current accommodation, that they can confidently expect to have enough money for rent and not to have to go cold or without food to make rent, and they deserve this legislation.

Deputy Eoin Ó Broin

First of all, I acknowledge the efforts the Minister has made since taking up his job to engage with all of the political parties in the housing committee and more generally in the Dáil. There are many things the Minister has said over the course of recent weeks which I find encouraging and give some hope in terms of the action plan for housing. I also agree with him that no party has a monopoly on concern. As constituency Deputies, we are all getting representations and we all work on these issues on a regular basis, but our responsibility here is to act.

It is because of the urgent need for action that I cannot accede to the Minister's request for an adjournment to the debate. We have been discussing rent certainty for some time. The Minister and his Cabinet colleagues would have discussed it during the run up to the decision on the amendment to the Residential Tenancies Act last year. Threshold has produced detailed reports and has lobbied Deputies on all sides of the House for some time. We know the issues involved. If we adjourn the debate and return after the summer recess, it will be the end of the year before legislation on the issue is enacted, if legislation is forthcoming from the Government at all. The people we need to help with spiralling rents cannot wait that long for this very modest measure.

The Minister repeated the Taoiseach's earlier comments that we are not giving the housing committee its place. I would take it seriously if the Minister had not launched the initiative he launched today. I have no problem with the initiative as long as it results in more affordable homes being provided on those sites. However, the initiative the Minister launched this morning is a matter the housing committee actively considered and which we will address in our recommendations on Friday. If the Minister is willing to pre-empt and take action on this one issue, I do not see how he can criticise us for, as he sees it, pre-empting and taking action on this issue.

Deputy Simon Coveney

It is because one is much more complex than the other.

Deputy Eoin Ó Broin

That is why we have a Second Stage debate followed by Committee and Report Stages to pass legislation. If we agree this here today, there will be plenty of time to go through it all.

Deputy Simon Coveney

Not on Committee Stage.

Deputy Eoin Ó Broin

I also agree with the Minister that landlords and the private rental sector are a key part of our housing system. I live in the private rental sector. I choose to live there and I want to continue living there. I am very happy to say, without hesitation, that we need a private rental system that is good for landlords and tenants. One of the values of rent certainty is that, over time, it would help deal with one of the systemic problems in our private rental sector, namely, too many accidental landlords who are governed, through no fault of their own in many cases, by short-term thinking rather than long-term, stable activity in the market. Deputy John Paul Phelan confuses rent controls and rent certainty. It is a pity he does not study hard enough to know the difference between the two. They are fundamentally different propositions and he will find many examples of rent certainty that make a positive contribution to other member states.

I say to the Minister of State, Deputy Joe McHugh, that I am guided by the evidence. There is no evidence to suggest that what the previous Government introduced in November is working. While the latest figures show the rate of rent price inflation is beginning to slow, it is still increasing. When the spat between the Minister for Finance, Deputy Noonan, and the then Minister for the Environment, Community and Local Government, Deputy Alan Kelly, first arose and the deadline was enacted for the new rent review regulations, there was a spike in rents and many people experienced two years worth of rent increases rather than one.

For those reasons, Sinn Féin will press the Bill and will continue to argue for it. If the Minister includes rent certainty in his action plan on housing, I will welcome it. I will wait and see. I am confused by Fianna Fáil's position, however. Deputy Barry Cowen spoke much about the rules but I am not sure what they are because when Sinn Féin introduced our first Private Members' motion, we were told it was not serious and the rules meant one had to introduce legislation. When we introduced legislation, we were told it was not the right way to proceed. While we are told we cannot pre-empt the housing committee, tomorrow Fianna Fáil Senators will bring forward a motion on housing with five specific recommendations to the Government which cover the territory of the housing and homelessness committee. I am most confused by the fact that, on Sunday, a senior spokesperson for Fianna Fáil called for rent certainty, involving linking rent reviews to the consumer price index, to be introduced urgently, yet today we have heard Fianna Fáil Deputies say it is a very bad thing.

I thank Deputies from the Labour Party, the Social Democrats, People Before Profit, the Anti-Austerity Alliance and the Independent benches for their support for our Bill. They are right; it is very modest and the private rental sector reform requires much more substantive and radical action. The central point at the heart of the Bill remains that there is an urgent crisis being caused by out of control rents. This modest measure, if enacted, and amended if required on Committee and Report Stages, would make a real difference to people's lives. On that basis, I urge all Deputies to support it.

Question put.

Acting Chairman (Deputy Bernard J. Durkan)

The division is postponed until Thursday, 16 June 2016.

The Dáil adjourned at 10.05 p.m. until 12 noon on Wednesday, 15 June 2016.