Stephen Donnelly (Wicklow, Independent) | Oireachtas source

I am unsure what the solution is to this issue. I have no idea whether what I have proposed would pass the Office of the Attorney General because we do not have access to such a resource. However, I suggest the Minister would consider the issue I am raising. It relates to a situation where a family home is possessed because of bad debt in a buy-to-let scenario. We could have a situation whereby a family has decided that pension pots are not the way to go, for a variety of smart reasons, and has decided to invest in a buy-to-let. For a variety of reasons the buy-to-let is not performing, partly because PRSI is paid on the income and they do not get to net off their costs against their revenue, as in any other business, and for several other Government-created reasons thanks to this Government and the last. The family income is more than adequate to service the family home. The bank can possess the buy-to let but it can also go after the family home because the equity will be in the family home. It does not seem like a sensible social outcome for people to lose their family homes because of a distressed buy-to-let when they can pay the mortgage on the family home. It is entirely possible that the only reason the buy-to-let is in financial difficulty is because of changes that came in to the buy-to-let market through Fianna Fáil.

That party took a business and did to it what has not been done to any other business in the country. It provided that when it was taxing profits, these particular businesses were no longer able to net off full costs against revenue. It was an outrageous thing to do. If one did this to any other business it would collapse. It was a preposterous thing to do but it was exacerbated greatly in the last budget when the Government decided to charge PRSI on rental income. We have a unique business sector whose rules if they were applied to any other sector would ensure that large swathes of businesses would go out of business in the morning. Landlords, for whatever reason, must deal with this nonsense. We have a bizarre scenario whereby a family could lose the family home by having invested in a buy-to-let and the only reason the buy-to-let is in financial difficulty is because two consecutive governments simply decided that it was no longer a business but some other thing.

I do not imagine that my amendment would necessarily pass muster with the Attorney General but it is an issue that I have called on the Minister to examine. I imagine the amendment will not pass but I am keen to get the thoughts of the Minister. Does the Minister agree in principle that it is a highly undesirable social outcome? Can the Minister propose something that might work to alleviate that?