Róisín Shortall (Dublin North West, Labour)

The Minister is being entirely disingenuous in the way she is answering the question. What is more, she is showing that she has no grasp of the issue. If the Minister speaks to members of the Simon Community, Threshold or Focus Housing they will all tell her of the severe difficulties she has caused for people at the lower end of the market, the most vulnerable people in grotty bedsits who do not have the strength to negotiate with the landlords with whom they have legal agreements. The Minister took the soft option by forcing those people to take the hit on it; they are taking the hit personally rather than driving down rents. The Minister has no information at her disposal on the level of rents at the lower end and should stop spoofing about this.

Dublin City Council has shown that it is possible to achieve savings through the introduction of RAS. This could be done on a national level. In the past five years, the Government has spent €2 billion on rent supplement. That is an enormous amount of money. If the Minister could get 16% savings on that it would represent a massive amount. What is the Minister doing specifically to reduce that bill and to ensure more people have the option of going on RAS, given that there are 33,000 people waiting for it at present?

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