Joe O'Reilly (Cavan-Monaghan, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I welcome the legislation, the primary objective of which is to achieve a level of harmonisation of local authority rents at national level to prevent huge variations from area to area. This has merit and is a worthy exercise. It is important to stress that this will not preclude the determination or the drawing up of a rental scheme by local authorities; this will remain as one of their reserved functions. It is critical that any assessment of local authority rent charged to an individual takes account of his or her ability to pay. That is what differentiates social housing from private housing and that objective is central to the new legislation. There will be a differential rent scheme to the extent that a person's ability to pay will be the key determinant. The Bill will seek to ensure there will not be a huge variation in rents from county to county.

The Bill aptly and correctly brings the rent allowance or rental support scheme that is partly within the remit of the Department of Social Protection under the umbrella of the local authorities.

It is important that this happen. Wonderful things have been happening in the Department of Social Protection under the Minister, Deputy Joan Burton, particularly the job activation schemes, which fit job and training opportunities to the individual and focus on the individual not as a recipient of welfare but as an active jobseeker. That has to be the philosophy. Everyone presenting for a rental subsidy should also be assessed individually and if appropriate accommodation is available within the local authority housing programme that should be the logical first response. Rent subsidy should be the second response when there is no possibility of providing accommodation from the local authority housing scheme. Human factors have to be considered too, such as where children are going to school. A case-by-case holistic approach is needed, which is similar to that required in job activation.

For too long we were inclined to dish out various welfare payments, whether jobseeker's allowance or, in this instance, rent allowance. Each application needs to be assessed on the basis of where the children are at school and whether they are well established in a social infrastructure. It is not reasonable to uproot children and take them to another town just because there is a local authority house available there. That would not be acceptable. We should have much more integration of services and interdepartmental cohesion. Bringing all payments connected with housing under the umbrella of the local authority is a great example of the reforming agenda of this Government, which is working in a range of areas. It is the job of the housing officer and his or her staff to study each individual case to see, as a first option, if there is appropriate local authority accommodation and to consider rent allowance as the second option, and then to monitor the transition to local authority housing as the case may be. It can happen that some local authority houses are vacant while, in parallel, people are on rent allowance, and the two things are not knitted together.

The RAS is a very good scheme for cases in which local authority housing is not the correct response. Integrating the RAS, the housing assistance scheme, the rent supplement scheme and housing policy generally is necessary and the Bill will achieve that aim. It is reforming legislation. We must recognise that the rental accommodation market has increased radically. The number of people renting in Ireland in both the private and local authority sectors has increased by 47% since 2006. To an extent we are becoming more like the continental Europeans and house ownership as a first option is fading, maybe out of necessity in many instances. We have to accommodate this new reality. That is why I am delighted there is an integrated response with an in-house one-stop shop in the local authorities.

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