Seán Ó Fearghaíl (Kildare South, Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

I move amendment No. 44:

In page 72, after line 31, to insert the following:"Provision of housing units

59.In the provision of housing units, a local authority shall give priority to persons that have been responsible tenants in leased accommodation under the Rental Accommodation Scheme.".

This amendment addresses one of the critical aspects of the Bill. It is interesting that this legislation has attracted a lot of public and media attention, which quite rightly recognises that the piece of business before us is very much a mixed bag. There are a number of positive aspects to the Bill to which I alluded in my Second Stage contribution and, together with my colleague, Deputy Cowen, I have attempted to recognise and support them. Effectively, the introduction of the housing assistance payment, HAP, is a positive and constructive development when viewed in isolation. Giving responsibility for HAP is an entirely positive development in circumstances where we hope to see local authorities staffing their housing departments in such a manner as to allow these payments to be made. We take it that housing authorities will provide the level of staffing required to enable the HAP system to operate. The Minister, the Government and the Department would be commended on introducing a system that breaks down the poverty trap that has existed as a result of the rent allowance and we would all shout, "Hooray, this is really good" if that was all that was happening. Rather than having a situation in which we can be entirely positive, we see what is a positive development matched on the other side by an equally negative situation. We are looking at a situation where the Minister of State is effectively extending the rental accommodation scheme, RAS, into a new arrangement which will be called HAP. The amendment seeks to address how local authorities will manage their stock in a manner that serves the best interests of the tenants and, ultimately, of the community.

The Bill explicitly states that a person who gets HAP will come off the local authority waiting list. The Minister of State, Deputy Jan O'Sullivan, stated that explicitly on the last occasion. She said: "No. They will be taken off the housing list but they can go on a transfer list." To date, we have discovered, from officials in her Department who contacted Kildare County Council, that the local authorities have been told to take all the RAS tenants off the list, and when HAP comes in they will have to take them all off.

Earlier this week the Department's officials went before the Joint Committee on Environment, Culture and the Gaeltacht and stated, as the Minister of State said here in the House, that once tenants get HAP, they come off the list. The Minister of State's answer is that she will put them on a transfer list. The difficulty with the Bill is that it provides for the applicants to be taken off the lists that have existed traditionally and which constitute the manner in which local authorities and the State evaluate and enumerate those in the respective areas in need of housing. The Minister of State said she will put them on a transfer list, but there is nothing about the transfer list in the Bill.

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