Joan Burton (Dublin West, Labour) | Oireachtas source

The most recent social welfare legislation amended the Social Welfare Acts to provide for a mandatory capacity in respect of allowing people offered new tenancies or places on the RAS to sign on to the household budgeting system operated through post offices because local authorities want to be assured they will receive rent contributions from tenants. I understand local authorities around the country have different levels of accumulated arrears from various types of tenants. This is an issue for local authorities. The Department of the Environment, Community and Local Government is interested in having my Department introduce a provision to deduct rents at source on behalf of local authorities but that would require considerable modification of our IT systems. I am open to the suggestion but, given that 66 separate differential rent schemes and at least the same number of IT systems are in place, the introduction of a deduction scheme via social welfare benefits would require significant streamlining in the way rents are charged. That is a major project but the Department of the Environment, Community and Local Government is currently preparing a business case for it.

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