Aengus Ó Snodaigh (Dublin South Central, Sinn Fein)

Aréir bhí mé ag labhairt ar an cheist seo sa chéad chuid den méid a bhí le rá agam. Luaigh mé go bhfuil 60,000 daoine ar an liosta feithimh le haghaidh tithíochta agus gur scannal é sin. Is gá dúinn, toisc go bhfuil an fhadhb seo againn san eacnamaíocht, déileáil leis seo. Is féidir linn déileáil le dhá rud ag an am céanna — tithe a thabhairt do dhaoine agus an eacnamaíocht a spreagadh. Tá dúshlán ann agus tá seans ag an Aire agus ag an Rialtas gníomhú chun déileáil leis an fhadhb seo.

We have reservations on the section dealing with anti-social behaviour. It lacks clarity and direction. Hopefully we can tease some of it out on Committee Stage. We believe a different approach is needed and we will table amendments to address that. We urge the Government to do the right thing on Committee Stage and to examine anti-social behaviour. The promotion of good estate management should be the priority of any anti-social behaviour strategy. Communities must be able to access well-resourced initiatives for the reduction and prevention of anti-social behaviour, including but not limited to family intervention and mediation services.

There is an urgent need to strengthen the Private Residential Tenancies Board as well in respect of landlords and tenants. There are a number of complaints in my constituency where local authority housing is next to private rented flats. The latter are prone to anti-social tenants in some areas. I refer to the inability of the local authority, the Garda Síochána and the landlords to address these tenants. One example concerns an area I visited last week, which has been totally regenerated. I refer to Fatima Mansions, where work is ongoing to finish the regeneration. Much work has been done by the community. Leading up to it, on St. Anthony's Road, there are a number of properties owned by the same family of landlords. Each dwelling has been sub-divided and the landlords seem to have gone out of their way to get the most troubled, difficult and disturbed tenants in Dublin.

The stories of residents put in context what they must deal with and amount to a cry for help to us to do something. The community has pulled together to do something about it but there must be a quicker mechanism. One woman moved into a new home in this regenerated area and said she was so excited about moving into her new home. She had been waiting years for it. She says she used to sit in the kitchen looking out at the kids playing but now she sits in the back room because she cannot sit in the front room watching the comings and goings on the road. She says that this includes drug dealing and people going to the toilet in doorways, especially No. 14, with the black steel door, and that the noise level, the filth on the road is horrible. She says it is much worse than the flats in the bad old days and wishes that somebody can do something because the landlords just want money.

I regularly visited Fatima Mansions in the bad old days and for an old resident of Fatima Mansions to compare the situation today with the old days shows the scale of this problem. Another woman says that since she moved into her home on St. Anthony's Road, she has had the horrendous experience of dealing with rat infestation relating to the houses adjoining hers. She says this is related to the dumping of rubbish, she has spent hundreds of euro trying to address this and has contacted the environmental health officer, Dublin City Council, public representatives and anyone who would try to help her with these problems. She says she has young children and has had to move them out of their bedrooms when they heard rats behind the walls in partitions. She says the ongoing difficulties of anti-social behaviour is terrible and that people are living in shocking conditions.

I want this Bill to address the fact that people are in receipt of rent supplement, are benefiting from the State subsidising landlords and there does not seem to be the same degree of caution or help given to these tenants. A proposed tenant for local authority housing is vetted. There are now tenancy training schemes but that does not apply to those in the private rented sector, nor does it apply to landlords so that they do not put a concentration of people with difficult problems, whether drug dealing or psychiatric cases, in one set of buildings. This greater concentration adds to the problem. There must be some mechanism so that if there is concentration, support is in place from the HSE, the local authority and the Garda Síochána if required. If there is a continuation of these problems there must be a quicker remedy for the community. Landlords have a duty to their tenants to keep their dwellings in a fit state and a duty to the community around the dwellings they are letting and making a profit from. I hope the Minister will address some of these issues.

With the collapse of the PPPs, there is concern that a number of flat complexes in this city earmarked for regeneration, in areas such as Cherry Orchard, have become vacant and have been boarded up pending regeneration. In St. Teresa's Gardens a number of dwellings have been boarded up with no prospect in the near future of the regeneration scheme taking off. The same is true of Dominic Street and St. Michael's Estate. This creates its own problems, with dereliction and the vacant look attracting the anti-social, hooligan element. This brings down the tone of the area and destroys the spirit of those who are holding out in the hope of regeneration. I ask the Minister to try to address this, and the collapse of the PPPs. We need more social housing so we can deal with the shortfall that will occur. All of the properties in the Dublin City Council housing stock that are lying vacant will not be replaced by new dwellings as promised when the State went down the foolish road of public private partnerships.

The Bill mentions schemes of lettings but I do not see a standardised scheme in it. As one goes across the country from local authority to local authority, why do we have different schemes of letting and different points schemes? It is absolutely crazy. Locally elected representatives, Deputies and the public should be able to understand the system rather than having to bounce through one, two or three variations. In this city there could be four local authorities with four different schemes, which would be absolutely crazy. I hope the Bill will produce a standardised scheme so everybody in the country will know where they stand in regard to the scheme of lettings.

I welcome the Minister's proposals to outlaw bedsits in the private sector. For years in this city we have been waiting on local authorities to replace bedsits in local authority flat complexes; this has not happened as quickly as was possible and the matter must be addressed.

The issue of subsidising private landlords was raised last night by Deputy Fahey. He bemoaned the amount of money spent by the State in subsidising private landlords and for once I agree with him. It was interesting, particularly as the issue was raised by him. The amount of money involved in this has gone through the roof. The latest figures for rent supplement amount to an increase of 20,000 people from this time last year. That money would be much better spent on local authority housing. Rather than spending such funding on private landlords through the rent supplement or rental accommodation scheme, the local authorities should buy up the empty apartments and houses around the country to replenish housing stock and address local authority housing waiting lists.

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