Michael McGrath (Cork South Central, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I move amendment No. 185:

In page 142, between lines 19 and 20, to insert the following:“Tax and fiscal treatment of landlords

60.The Minister shall within 3 months of the passing of this Act, prepare and lay before the Oireachtas a report on the implementation or non-implementation of the proposals outlined in the Report of the Working Group on the Tax and Fiscal Treatment of Rental Accommodation Providers and reasons for the non-implementation of any proposals outlined in that report.”.

This relates to the report of the working group on the tax and fiscal treatment of rental accommodation providers, which was published on budget day last year. The Minister has made some moves on the options set out. I realise these were not recommendations but they were options and they were costed. It is important and timely, given the housing crisis, for the Minister to clarify the intention with regard to the remaining options that have not been implemented.

The Fianna Fáil Party welcomes the acceleration of mortgage interest deductibility for landlords. During our discussions with the Fine Gael Party in advance of the budget, we discussed other options, in particular, encouraging longer-term tenancies. This is a real structural issue in the Irish rental market. Tenancies are too short-term in nature. We need to get to a point where people have far longer security of tenure. This could include rental agreements for ten, 15 or 20 year periods. We need to recognise and accommodate this in our taxation system.

The other issue we discussed was the possibility of incentivising the purchase of a property with a tenant in situ. In the current market, where an owner is selling a property with a tenant, the tenant is often served with notice because the prospective purchaser wants vacant possession, even if the prospective purchaser intends to let out the property again. There is also an issue with regard to incentivising the purchase of properties where transactions are going to happen anyway. In certain cases it may be beneficial to incentivise a purchase where a tenant remains in situso that the tenant avoids the disruption of having to leave a property because the home is being sold, perhaps even to another investor. Not all these options were in the initial report but I believe they should be considered. The Minister indicated to us that he would consider further options in the context of the Finance Bill.