Róisín Shortall (Dublin North West, Independent) | Oireachtas source

I welcome the opportunity to speak on this legislation, although I would point out that the standard practice is to allow Members two weeks to consider a new Bill. This is a fairly substantial Bill with 51 sections. The idea of publishing it last Friday and having the debate this week is quite unreasonable and one would have to wonder if the Government's concern is more with the election and being seen to be doing something for the election rather than giving Members adequate time to consider the Bill.

However, having said that, I welcome, in principle, most of the provisions of the Bill but we need more detail on some aspects of it. Indeed, there is some provisions in the Bill about which I have some concerns. As others said, the Bill seeks to make three important changes to the whole area of housing legislation and I want to deal with each of those three areas. The first concerns changes to section 62 of the Housing Act, which I very much welcome. We have waited a very long time for the Department's response to the High Court judgment of February 2012. This has been raised on umpteen occasions in this House, including on the Order of Business and by way of parliamentary questions. There was no ultimate sanction in terms of local authority tenants engaging in anti-social activity. While that sanction might rarely be used, it is very important it is there. It left local authority staff quite powerless in local communities in terms of dealing with serious anti-social activity.

Why was it that the Minister of State did not fast track that legislation? She knew there was a lacuna there for some time and the difficulties it was causing? It was regrettable that she did not allocate more resources to tackling it. I understand two of the officials who had been dealing with it moved on to something else and a long period of time was wasted in terms of dealing with this pressing issue. As a result of that, local authorities were very much left in the lurch and they were unable to execute evictions against people who were perpetrating serious anti-social activity against their neighbours. We all know evictions should be the final recourse. Nobody wants to see people being evicted on any kind of large scale but, as I said, it is important it is available as a last resort for local authorities.

In the short time I have had to look at this, and while I welcome in it in principle, only time will tell whether it is strong enough. I certainly would have liked to have had an opportunity to consult Dublin City Council officials in this regard. They have been lobbying for the legislation to be updated for a very long time but, unfortunately, the timescale provided did not allow for that which is regrettable.

I welcome the introduction of tenancy warning procedures, which is a good idea. The Minister of State might clarify the position in regard to excluding orders which are also an important part of the measures available to local authorities in terms of dealing with anti-social activity and I very much welcome that provision in this Bill. However, I would like clarification on the lower age group against whom excluding orders can be used. It is certainly not enough to ensure a situation where a local authority has to notify the HSE or the Child and Family Agency. The State cannot be in a position where it makes a minor homeless and then wash its hands of responsibility. There must be a clear handing over procedure involved and I am not sure the legislation is sufficiently robust in that regard.

In regard to the new tenant purchase scheme, I very much welcome the extension of opportunities for people to purchase their homes but I would give it a guarded welcome in so far as there is a real danger we would end up losing a lot of the housing stock. Experience has shown that has happened in the past where extremely attractive schemes were offered to people and the State ended up with a very much depleted housing stock. We need to ensure that does not happen again. I would like the Minister of State to clarify whether tenants in local authority maisonettes will be included in the purchase scheme because that it not clear in the Bill. Clearly, the terms have to be attractive for tenants but they should not be too attractive. We need to ensure the State maintains sufficient housing stock to meet the needs that are there, which we know are very substantial.

I welcome, in principle, the proposal to introduce a new housing assistance payment. The Minister of State will be aware that I have been campaigning in this area for a number of years and I brought forward proposals on this and I am glad to see a number of the proposals have been included in the provisions. There are two great benefits from switching people from rent supplement to such a payment. The local authority pays the full rent directly to the landlord, so issues with tax evasion, poor quality housing, anti-social behaviour, security of tenure and so on can be effectively dealt with. The system also has the potential to prevent the loss of deposits which is very prevalent under the rent supplement scheme. It is estimated that approximately €7 million is lost every year as a result of this. It is not clear what the position is in regard to deposits under this housing assistance payment. If the onus is on the tenant to secure the housing, how can she or he do this without putting down a deposit? Who pays the deposit? If it is the tenant, how will it be reimbursed and how can one ensure it is reimbursed?

How will the deposit be retrieved by the local authority when the tenant moves on? I would be grateful if the Minister of State would clarify those points.

The second great benefit of moving tenants onto a local authority's differential rent scheme would be to remove a very significant unemployment and poverty trap. The vast majority of welfare recipients are better off when they take up employment, except of course many of those who are on rent supplement. One flaw, however, is that under Part 4 of the scheme, households benefitting from HAP will be deemed to have their housing need met. While the provisions of the Bill should provide for a better deal for tenants and improved security of tenure over the current rent supplement arrangements, the scheme far from meets the long-term needs of low income families. This provision is particularly unfair on existing tenants who have a place on their local authority's waiting list. What is to happen to them? If the provision is not removed from the Bill before enactment, it will seriously undermine the attractiveness of the scheme for tenants.

I would also like to know the amount of extra resources local authorities will receive to manage the extra properties and the responsibilities in regard to tenants who will come under that remit. Will HAP tenants have a tenancy agreement with the local authority, and will it have the same provisions as tenants have in local authority housing in respect of anti-social behaviour? We all know from dealing with problems of anti-social behaviour at local level that at least under section 62 there was a provision for dealing with that by local authorities. The big problem related to rent supplement tenants causing trouble locally was there was no mechanism for dealing with them. I seek clarification from the Minister of State as to whether the Bill will deal with the issue. The responsibilities of landlords should be set out clearly. While I welcome the provisions in as far as they go, I stress that the Bill goes nowhere in terms of tackling the major housing problem we have at the moment, which principally relates to the lack of supply.

I have not had a chance to read Construction 2020 but I have serious concerns about what has been mooted in recent days in respect of the mortgage insurance scheme. That would be a retrograde step for the Minister of State to take because it would only fuel the spiralling crisis. That is not the problem; the problem is one of supply. The points made by Deputy Wallace were important. I refer to the need to put in place measures to free up development land and to introduce punitive taxation measures to bring the land into use.

I again appeal to the Minister of State to look carefully at some of the measures open to her to deal with one element of housing, namely, improving the supply of good quality accommodation for older people in order that they can surrender their houses or sell them and free up family homes. There is a lot of spare capacity throughout the country. The financial contribution scheme was used very widely in the Dublin City Council area in my constituency to very good effect. The scheme was very successful but it has ceased now as funding is not available. I strongly appeal to the Minister of State to consider reintroducing the scheme because it has the potential to address a number of housing supply issues.

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