Richard Boyd Barrett (Dún Laoghaire, People Before Profit Alliance) | Oireachtas source

Deputy Matthews made the bulk of the point. I was curious when he said there might be people on lower or middle incomes who had a vacant property who, for whatever reason, have decided to leave the property vacant. I am struggling to imagine a person on a low to middle income who can afford to leave a property vacant. I just cannot envisage many such cases. I am not saying the odd such case might not exist. One could qualify the tax with some provisions which would state that if there is a good or exceptional reason, it can be appealed if a rationale can be provided, such as a personal or family-related reason. I cannot really think of one. That does not seem a terribly credible argument for not addressing the far big danger that it will continue to be profitable, from a capital gains point of view, for people to sit on empty property. The level of the tax will be a fraction of the capital gains they are likely to achieve based on the recent appreciation in property values.

I have cited one example. I could cite more. It is a significant grievance of people in my area, as it is in many, to see places that could be used sitting empty year after year. Everybody knows the people who are sitting on those properties are wealthy. They are happy to sit on a vacant property because it is a valuable asset which is appreciating in value and nothing is being done about it. The penalty has to be made punitive. There is a much bigger danger if it is ineffective.

The Minister and I may differ on this point. I think the stakes are really high because the housing crisis is so bad. The Minister's caution and statement that we should be careful and review this as we go might be a reasonable position to take if we were not facing the current dire situation. When we are faced with the sort of human misery, suffering, hardship and trauma that so many families and children are now facing, there is no time to work out whether this will work. We have to make sure it works. We have to drive those vacant properties back into use as a matter of urgency. Whatever about debates on whether Housing for All is adequate, I think we all accept that we are a long way from where we need to be. We need to get to where we want to go with regard to addressing this housing crisis as quickly as possible.

I ask the Minister to seriously consider this. Deputy Matthews made the point himself so it is not just the lefties who are saying this.