Mr. John Kennedy:

Much of the debate has centred on price, and we then moved to affordability from the point of view of the tenant, which is key. That should not be at the cost of the affordability of being able to sustain being a property owner. There is an old Newton's law of physics that for every action there is an opposite and equal reaction. For everything that was done for the tenant positively, which I have no problem with, no consideration was given to the other side in terms of creating equilibrium.

Deputy Boyd Barrett referred to fixing rents. Is it profitable to continue to be in that investment class if private landlords or owners continue to supply that? The burden has been put on the individual rather than the State in terms of dealing with rising rents. As I said, landlords are being subjugated. I understand the figure for rent is about 40% of net take-home pay. Even at a rate of 30%, people are overburdened in terms of paying a rent or mortgage. It is outrageous to have to put that much net income towards rent and have no disposable income left.

The problem with RPZs is that there is no relation to whether the cost of supply is linked to them. That has been a major policy fault.

We do not think of the other side. The result, unfortunately, is that the very opposite of the thing the RPZ system was set up to do has happened. There is less supply because of the RPZs and there will continue to be less supply in the market. I would like to see more reasonable rents for tenants. That can be achieved through supply. The RPZ system ultimately does more damage in the long term than-----