Vol. 522 No. 4
9 Mr. McDowell asked the Minister for the Environment and Local Government when he expects to receive the report of the Commission on the Private Rented Residential Sector; when it is intended to publish the report; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [18653/00]
I understand that the Commission on the Private Rented Residential Sector is working intensively on finalising its recommendations and I expect to receive the report of the commission in early July. I will carefully examine the conclusions and recommendations of the commission and will then arrange for submission of the report to Government with a view to publication. I expect that the outcome of the commission's deliberations will provide a firm basis for future policy development in relation to this key housing sector.
Does the Minister accept the situation in the private rented sector is critical, that tenants are facing huge rents, that those rents can be increased at will by landlords, that, unlike most other countries—
Question Time is for the purpose of seeking information.
It is very difficult to get it.
The Deputy does not want it when he gets it.
The Deputy appears to be asking the Minister to accept certain matters. The real purpose of Question Time is to seek information. I ask Deputies to bear that in mind.
I am trying to seek information on whether the Minister has any grasp of the problem people have in the private rented sector. Does the Minister accept there is a need to introduce legislation to provide for rent certainty and security of tenure for tenants and to introduce some kind of forum or housing court where tenants and landlords can resolve their difficulties, as is the case in most other European countries?
Of course I am aware of all this and it is the reason I set up the commission.
If the Minister was aware of it, why did he need the commission?
The commission is finalising its work at the moment. The Deputy should bide his time and wait and see what the recommendations will be.
I am tired of waiting.
I have appointed a representative group to examine this issue – they are representative of landlords, tenants, the legal profession and others in the property market. The terms of reference of the commission are set in a fair and balanced way and solutions will have to be fair and balanced as well. We want to achieve the objective of increasing the amount of property available for rent. We want a fair regime for tenants and landlords. Much time and effort has gone into examining this issue. I expect we will have the results of all that work within the next few weeks. Shortly after that, we will publish the commission's deliberations and then we can have a full debate on the issue in the House.
Does the Minister agree that when something becomes scarce, it becomes more expensive and that the real issue is that there is no incentive for people to enter into the business of providing proper rented accommodation? Is he also aware that, as a result of a lack of policy in this area, more tenants living in private rented accommodation are being evicted on a daily basis by District Courts, particularly around this city? I can quote the Minister examples. Rent for a semi-detached three bedroom house went from £400 per month, with health board subsidy, to £1,000 per month. The courts are granting eviction orders against those tenants and they are ending up on local authority housing lists. The Minister does not need a commission. They must be dizzy in that Department with all the commissions and consultants—
It is the only one.
Does the Minister have proposals to encourage landlords, by way of incentives, to grant long-term leases to tenants because whether we like it, we are entering into a period where more people will spend their lives in rented accommodation rather than purchase accommodation?
I do not know where Deputy Barrett has been—
I have been here.
—in that he does not seem to be aware of the extensive work that has been going on for the past 12 months. This work is under way because of my concern about security of tenure for tenants. Whatever action we take will be based on full and careful consideration of the various options that might be open to the Government. As I have already said, I expect the work of the commission will be very helpful in those deliberations and will influence, I hope, to some extent, whatever policy decisions we make in this area.
I am not satisfied to continue with the present system. The law in regard to the letting of rented property has to be changed. The difficulty is to ensure that in making changes and in giving security of tenure to tenants that we do not do so in a way which drives landlords out of this business. Members will know how carefully one has to balance this. There are two sides to this argument. I have every intention of addressing it in a sensible and considered way.
Do the terms of reference to which the Minister referred take into consideration the demand for rented accommodation on a yearly basis? Does he accept that the measures introduced last week by the Minister for Finance will mean demand in this city over the next five years will not be met in that somewhere in the region of 5,000 units are required for rent? What steps will the Minister take to help parents of students who will come to this city later this year and who will not be able to get rented accommodation because there will be another 25% or 30% increase in rent?
If we can have price control in relation to the price of the pint, why can we not have proper rent control? The Minister referred previously to constitutional difficulties in relation to this matter. Will he outline what those constitutional difficulties are?
I have not referred to constitutional difficulties.
The Minister certainly has in previous questions I asked in this House.
I have not referred to them today. I am not too sure of the context to which the Deputy is referring. Deputy Farrelly referred to students. I remind him that we took action in the budget two years ago by introducing a tax incentive scheme to encourage people to invest in providing accommodation for students in association with the third level colleges. There has been an outstanding response to that. Many thousands of accommodation units are in the pipeline, some are under way and others are in the planning pro cess. This will result in a substantial number of units being built which will be dedicated to providing accommodation for students in or near the campuses of third level colleges. I encourage those colleges which have not encouraged this type of development to do so.
We must move on to Question No. 10.
The Minister did not answer my question.
The Minister did not answer my question about the shortage of rented accommodation—
We are now dealing with Question No. 10.
At least we took action. No action was taken to provide proper accommodation for students in the past ten years.
