Bernard Durkan (Kildare North, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

This is an issue of special interest to every Member. I agree with many of the opinions expressed by Deputy Catherine Murphy in this regard. I do not agree with the shift towards private rental as opposed to reliance on the local authority system, to which we have become accustomed for many years. The old system had far greater stability with far greater commitment of the individual to the house. People believed it was their entitlement to own their house at some stage. That has all been put in abeyance because of developments in the housing sector in the past ten years or so. I do not blame those who are now in opposition who were responsible for allowing that to happen.

However, we have imported the worst practices from the UK which have been found to be most punitive for the tenants, most unreliable in meeting the housing needs of people and most expensive for the tenants. It has not necessarily been of any great benefit to the landlords either. Extraordinarily, at a time when it should not have happened at all, 100,000 families are now on local authority waiting lists, which is an absolute disgrace. None of those families has the possibility in the foreseeable future of being housed by anybody. The suggestion is that they be referred to private rented accommodation in the meantime. However, when the market tightens up, as it invariably does, those people have nowhere to go or else the rent is increased in which case the Department of Social Protection must take responsibility for doing the job of the local authorities.

I also attribute some blame to the local authorities in recent years for what I regard as resiling from their responsibilities on housing gradually and inexorably. The system is disorganised and dispute-ridden. The dispute resolution mechanism does not seem to work. It is heavily bureaucratised in its paperwork requirements resulting in countless people in countless offices having to pore over countless application forms containing ridiculous questions such as "Where were you born?" and "What is your language?" Two or three lines further down the same question is asked under a different guise. I do not know what has happened, but we now have serious issues.

Deputy Catherine Murphy made reference to the shared-ownership scheme, which is an appalling morass. People entered that scheme on the basis that it was a flexible scheme, which, incidentally, was also imported from the UK. They were advised that part of the equity would be subject to their ongoing mortgage interest payments etc., with which there is no problem. The other part of the equity was based on rental. They were told clearly and repeatedly that the only requirement there was that they would have to pay rental on that part of the equity and they would be obliged within 25 years to enter into an agreement to purchase the second half of the equity, but nothing more than that. Over the years that was changed, by whom I do not know. However, now they must purchase the second part of the equity in the 25 years. That was never intended and people were misled. It is utterly crazy and cannot be done. The result is that the rental part of the equity in terms of cost to the tenant exceeds the purchase part, which is also utterly crazy. It just does not add up. Those vulnerable people in that sector of the housing market are being punished for being there. They are being caught between the State on the one hand and the private sector on the other, which is appalling.

Some years ago in this House we decided it would be beneficial to everybody to simplify the language used in drafting Bills. In terms of simplicity personified, section 4(5) states:

(5) The Table to section 34 of the Principal Act is amended by inserting the following paragraph after paragraph 4:

“4A.—In the case of a dwelling referred to in section 3(4)(a) (inserted by section 3 of the Residential Tenancies (Amendment) Act 2012[this one]), the dwelling or the property containing that dwelling is to be returned to the public authority, referred to in section 3(2A) (inserted by section 3 of the Residential Tenancies (Amendment) Act 2012), concerned because the period for which that dwelling or property was let to the approved housing body concerned will, in accordance with the tenancy, between the approved housing body and the public authority, expire within 6 months of the service of the notice of termination under this section and that tenancy between the public authority and the approved housing body is not being renewed.”.

The case rests there. Even Deputy O'Dea would be dumbfounded by that one. I have never seen anything like that in my life and I have been in this House for a few years now. It is utterly incredible. I do not criticise the Minister of State because I am quite sure she did not draft it herself. That section must be the ultimate in terms of trying to confound and confuse everybody.

I wish to refer briefly to a number of points made by previous speakers, one being the question of anti-social behaviour. It has become an appalling problem in both public and private residential areas. It must be remembered there are those who, by virtue of having no commitment to a dwelling or to their or their children's future in that dwelling, think they can do what they like and they make life utterly unbearable for their neighbours. The time has come when they must have responsibility for their actions. We cannot allow such behaviour by people whether they have a drug addiction or some other problem. We must help out where we can but we go on indefinitely allowing the dumbing down of residential areas by virtue of the anti-social activity of a minority of people.

I wish to refer the voluntary housing agencies in particular which are covered under the Bill. Many voluntary housing agencies do good work but I have serious issues with the formation of agencies under the capital allowance scheme where the State bought and paid for properties and handed them over, free gratis, to voluntary agencies whose only responsibility is to collect the rents and they get a grant from the State to carry out maintenance on an annual basis. We imported that model from the UK. It is possibly the most irresponsible thing that was ever done by legislators. I cannot believe that it happened. Some of these agencies are reliable, responsible and good but some are not. Some of them do not operate at all and some operate in a very haphazard fashion. It is their intention in some quarters to acquire the properties in their own right at some stage in the future. There are currently moves afoot to do that and careful attention is being paid to the day that will dawn when they will be able to do that and challenge the State. This kind of thing is outrageous. Waiting in the wings is the most appalling scam in this area that will occur in the next ten or 15 years if it is allowed to continue.

I have spoken to the Minister of State about this and she understands this quite well. This is not a criticism of her because she and her colleagues inherited this problem but something has got to be done about this as a matter of urgency. Where the State has bought and paid for something, it has a right to own it and if it wants to let a property to a tenant, it has the right to do that while being responsible, upfront and direct in the first instance and not handing it over to somebody else to administer it. I blame the local authorities, to some extent, for allowing this to happen as well and they, in turn, will blame the Department of Environment, Community and Local Government over the same period, but whoever was to blame we are now in a difficult, doubtful and dangerous situation. There are more than 30,000 houses held in this fashion by various voluntary bodies throughout the country. Some of them administer well, some do not administer at all, some have not met for years and some have no structure - there is no accountability, they do not collect rent or do anything. It is appalling. I hope that in the course of this debate there will be an opportunity to review the entire scheme with a view to finding out to what extent the State can protect itself because we have had enough inquiries in recent years. We can prevent something of this nature, we should do it and we should do so now.

I wish to refer to the point made by Deputy Catherine Murphy on the rent support scheme as it currently applies. I have always believed that the Department of Social Protection should not be forced to the extent it is forced to support the rental system. The State through the local authorities should be providing housing for people who are within that income bracket. That was always the case and it worked very well. A general ceiling on rents is applied across a whole area but that does not work because there are variations within areas that make it virtually impossible for somebody to acquire a house that falls within that rent level. People then start to top up the amount and those with relatives or friends to pay the top-up can be housed but those who do not have that facility cannot. They are on the point of being homeless and will be made homeless. I ask the Minister of State to bear that in mind.

Another issue regarding the voluntary housing agencies is how the rent is determined. The local authority has a system whereby the net income is taken into account in determining the rent but some voluntary housing agencies have a system whereby the gross income is used to determine the rent level. It is appalling to have such a variation in that system and I do not know for what purpose that is done. This is another area that requires urgent attention and there is provision in the Bill to do that. It is the one aspect of this complicated legislation that I welcome.

I wish to refer to an issue on which I have spoken in the House on many occasions over the years, as has the Acting Chairman. We need to achieve some level of reliability, continuity and safeguards in the interests of people who become tenants in the future. The more we move away from that, the more short-term rental accommodation we introduce in the country, the more disorganised our society will become and the more vulnerable people will feel in rental accommodation because if they lose their job they may have to move on quickly and their children will have to attend new schools. They may not be able to get accommodation where they want to get it and as a result the whole social structure of the lives of those families will be seriously undermined. There is a huge area we as legislators need to attend to as a matter of urgency and I would like to have an opportunity to comment further on this on Committee Stage.

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