Jan O'Sullivan (Limerick East, Labour)

I found the contributions from speakers opposite to be somewhat pathetic. They spoke about the importance of protecting businesses and the unfortunate legal reasons that they cannot do what obviously needs to be done. The Government is taking a cannot-do attitude. It cannot get the banks to lend to small businesses or help them hold on to their employees and it cannot do anything about upward-only rent reviews. We need to see a can-do attitude because we were elected to this House to solve the country's problems.

Deputy Ciarán Lynch has stated that he introduced this Bill, for which I commend him, in the knowledge that the Government may not be willing to accept it in its entirety and that he is happy to see it amended as necessary. All we have heard from Government Deputies, however, is that they wish to do something but unfortunately they cannot. This must be an extremely dispiriting outcome for the thousands of people who have contacted us by e-mail over the past week or who have followed the debate from the Visitors Gallery. These people are struggling to keep their businesses alive but now they are being told the Government can do nothing for them.

If contractually agreed rents can be adjusted upwards, I do not see why they cannot also be reviewed downwards. I do not understand why these obstacles are being erected. We have been told by the Government that this is because of constitutional imperatives but I understand the Landlord and Tenant Acts allow rights to be taken from landlords in certain circumstances and I have been advised by someone with legal expertise that an escape clause or compensation mechanism might address any constitutional infirmity in the legislation. Nominal compensation to the landlord may be a way around the obstacle.

We are here to solve the problems that face our country rather than hide behind obstacles. If we are worth our salt as public representatives, we will listen to the people when they tell us about their problems. Like everybody else, I have spoken to business owners in my constituency. In areas of Limerick which have been subject to urban regeneration schemes, the very landlords who received sizeable tax incentives from the public purse are now seeking to increase rents.

We are beginning to see ghost streets where businesses are closing in the heart of my city and, I am sure, elsewhere. We simply cannot allow this to continue because these businesses are the bedrock of our economic recovery. Multinationals will come and go but indigenous companies are our hope for the future and we have to find ways of supporting them. We cannot allow them to close their doors because of legal mechanisms that make no sense in the current economic climate. They have clearly experienced decreases in sales volumes and are facing significant difficulties in paying overheads and remaining open. The idea that one cannot revise downwards a rent set at a time when the economy was in a completely different position is nonsense.

If constitutional obstacles arise, I suggest we can find remedies for them, and if the Government wishes to amend elements of the Bill, it should do so. The Labour Party is attempting to address an extremely serious issue for businesses in this country and the least we expect from the Government is a can-do rather than a cannot-do response. Hiding behind the advice of the Attorney General when nobody else is allowed to examine it is not acceptable for a Government, even one which I hope will not be in power for much longer.

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