Eoghan Murphy (Dublin Bay South, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

The reason the legislation applies only to rent pressure zones is that our legal advice is that we had to tie the provisions to areas in which there is known and quantified demand and pressure on the rental market, be it related to a lack of stock or an increase in price. That is what rent pressure zones, in effect, identify. The legal advice was to tie the legislation to rent pressure zones which is why we have done so. The objective here is to get properties that would otherwise have been long-term rentals but have gone into the short-term rental market back into the former. That would be a good thing and would mean more landlords operating. It is good to know Deputy Barry welcomes more landlords operating in this space.

We will carry out a review. The legislation will take a few months to bed down and it would be wise to look at it after six months of this being properly in effect. Some local authorities will be quicker off the mark than others and we will be able to conduct peer reviews between local authority areas. For the joint committee itself, six months into next year would absolutely be a good time to carry out a review to see what exactly we have achieved. Currently, my Department is discussing with local authorities the reporting requirements they will have around enforcement.