Olwyn Enright (Laois-Offaly, Fine Gael)

I wish to make two brief points in regard to the mortgage interest supplement and rent supplement.

I welcome that the Minister for the Environment, Heritage and Local Government is developing a policy in respect of anti-social behaviour. However, I know of, as I am sure do my colleagues, many local authorities that currently have in place such policies. The difficulty that arises — the Minister will discover this when dealing with local authorities in respect of rent supplement — is that a local authority, community welfare officer or any other person given responsibility for people on rent supplement, is powerless to act where one person in a family is causing trouble as they cannot penalise an entire family owing to the behaviour of one person. I accept this difficulty is not the fault of Government, but it is a reality that makes it difficult to properly tackle anti-social behaviour.

On quality of accommodation, I agree with Deputy Wall that there is no flexibility in terms of tenants moving accommodation. On RAS, while I believe it is a good scheme a message must go out from local authorities that a person who signs up to the RAS scheme remains eligible for local authority housing. There is a huge fear among people visiting clinics that this is not the case. When an official inspects accommodation on behalf of the HSE, naturally the person in poor accommodation will fare better than the person living in good accommodation, as his or her need is seen to be greater. A person trying to do the best for his or her family by signing up to the RAS scheme is fearful of being penalised and we must address this issue.

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